


Scales

by jeejaschocolate



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Alternate Universe - Merpeople, Brief mentions of gore, Cultural Relativism, Denial of Feelings, Dubious Ethics, Enthusiastic Consent, Happy Murder Family, Historical Fantasy, Infidelity, Intersex Anatomy, Loss of Virginity, M/M, Mer!Ninchi, Misunderstandings, Mpreg, Murder, No Incest, Penis In Vagina Sex, Sea captain!Shido, Soul Bond, brief descriptions of gore, mating for life, monster fucking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-10-05
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:20:45
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 48,544
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26171080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeejaschocolate/pseuds/jeejaschocolate
Summary: Captain Shido Masayoshi’s ship goes down in the middle of the ocean. He is saved by a creature of legend and nursed back to health on a deserted island...It’s curious how perfect the mermaid boy is for him.
Relationships: Akechi Goro/Shido Masayoshi, Cognitive Akechi Goro/Shadow Shido Masayoshi
Comments: 20
Kudos: 78





	1. Cursed Luck

**Author's Note:**

> In collaboration with [this beautiful Mer!Ninchi art](https://twitter.com/vanaaer/status/1298244429631729664?s=20)
> 
> [Some reference pics](https://www.shutterstock.com/video/clip-21673654-red-silver-siamese-fighting-fish-betta-isolated) of the real life fish used in the mermaid design. Silver and red betta fish (these are fairly aggressive fish too btw). 
> 
> Anyways, this is pure indulgence. Mermaid!AU, but the Goro in this fic is solely based off the cognitive Akechi we see in Shido's palace. His name is Ninchi (but he doesn't know that yet lol, nobody tell him). The Shido here could really be either shadow version or the regular version, so take him as you will. Still basically shiake, but there is NO INCEST. In this one they're not related and not even the same species actually lol. I'm going for a different dynamic ;) 
> 
> **Be Mindful**: I am not tagging the (sexy) things that will happen in future chapters yet. Will add them as the chapters are posted. But the rating is there now so keep in mind that this fic is going in a very....monster fuck-y direction. 
> 
> First chapter is mostly set up and world building. Because, I ask you, what is porn without world building. Lol.

**Chapter One: Cursed Luck**

The crack in the midship beam is what does it in. The Ark---Captain Shido Masayoshi’s government chartered vessel, his most prized possession, his life itself---is sinking. 

“Captain! She’s going down! We have to abandon her!” 

Shido is standing at the steering wheel, furiously turning and readjusting his path. The thunderstorm has made the waves as high and unscalable as literal mountains, and the pounding rain coming at them from all sides makes visibility nearly impossible. His uniform is beaten to shreds and his knuckles are bleeding---but like hell will he ever give in! 

“No,” he answers his midshipman. Not particularly caring if they can even hear his voice over the cacophony of the shipwreck.

Shido’s crew is in disarray, throwing themselves overboard. Fools. Traitors! Worthless penny-quibbling scum! They would abandon him when he needs them the most!

“But sir--!”

Shido ignores them all. He continues turning the wheel despite the fact that there is nearly nothing left to steer---the boards and the gears are disintegrating under the weight of the ship itself. Scattering out to sea. 

Shido has seen storms before! He’s been through worse! He can do this! If he can just get back control of the main rudder---

With a primordial scream, lightning strikes the port beam. A crack bursts through the planks to meet the midship fracture, and suddenly the ship is in two. Two whole pieces, aft and fore, drifting rapidly apart. 

Several crew members lose their lives right then and there. Plunged into the black, churning, watery depths below. 

Damn the sea! Damn it all to hell!

Shido grips the steering wheel with a rage he rarely ever shows. All his ambition, everything he worked for, shattering to splinters right in front of his eyes! The governor trusted him with The Ark, for the last ten years! And now, to see it end like this! 

Shido can’t accept it! 

Even as the captain’s bridge begins to sink into the ocean, Shido clings to his steering wheel. He won’t let this go! Not on his life! The planks underneath his feet may have collapsed, he may be hanging off the steering wheel, feet dangling in midair as the forward bow begins to capsize. But he….will _not…_! 

He will not let go! 

As if in answer to his stubbornness, the steering wheel itself breaks off the wheelhouse and Shido finds himself falling. The helm still clutched in his unyielding grip. Now it’s nothing more than a worthless hunk of wood. 

He lands in the ocean with a sobering crash. Water this rough is like knives, even to Shido’s sun-worn skin. He thrashes his legs as he recognizes his body is sinking. He can’t breathe. He can’t hear; the muted sound of unfeeling water rushes in his ears. Underneath the water’s surface everything is suspended in time. Floating. Powerless. He sees several of his men’s corpses drifting around him. Their faces twisted in silent screams. 

Pieces of The Ark, bits of wood, sink to the ocean’s depths. Shido cannot see the floor. It must be several miles below. 

He’s sinking fast. Debris, the scattered remains of his life’s work, rain down around him in quiet destruction. 

Shido stops fighting. He looks at the steering wheel in his hands and decides...it’s useless. 

Slowly, one finger at a time, he lets go. 

If the sea’s boundless rage doesn’t kill him, if he doesn’t drown, then this will. Letting go of The Ark. Accepting defeat. Watching his past and future crumble all at once.

It’s over. Everything’s over. Ruined. Senselessly, utterly, and completely. It’s all over.

As Shido sinks, down, down, and slowly loses consciousness, he only has one thought: He might as well be dead already.

_________________________________ 

The Sharkblood Clan rejoices! They’ve happened upon a rare but welcome treat. 

Bits of wood falling from the water’s surface. Indicative of humans and their seafaring vessels. This clan---known as the Sharkblood clan, since they are carnivores who hunt for food, killing it with their own sharp teeth as sharks do, leaving blood in the water---is averse to all humans and their insidious presence. But they’re predators. They enjoy the spoils of a good hunt. Shipwrecks usually lead to bounties of scavenged food! Fish hidden inside shiny cans that can be peeled open with their teeth and feasted upon to gluttony. 

Furthermore, they can eat the corpses of humans that fell to their doom. 

Tonight will be a feast! They sing at each other in their minds, sharing the elation, as they stockpile their loot from the shipwreck.

A Sharkblood boy rather likes the fish found in a can. He likes it better than the taste of human flesh. So as he swims with his brethren, he looks for shiny objects that might hold mashed fish inside. Focusing solely on the cans while his companions collect human bodies. 

He sees something shiny when he raises his eyes. The moon’s rays peak through the water and reflect off something metallic. Glinting with promise. He swims closer.

Not just one shiny thing—but several! There are almost a dozen shiny ornaments winking at the Sharkblood boy. His mahogany crimson eyes light up with greed and singular curiosity. He swims closer and closer....

The shimmering objects are attached to something. A body—a human body! The boy recoils automatically, reversing his tail to swim backwards. 

It’s a man. He has fur on his face but not on his head. His mouth and chin are covered in black hair, a thick beard and mustache. He is bald. Does that mean he’s old, in human years? He doesn’t seem so old, though...

More fascinating than that, he is covered in shiny things! Silver and gold circles dot his chest, connected to him with striped ribbons of all different colors. The Sharkblood boy has never seen a human wearing so many shiny things at once! Sometimes he sees pearls around their necks or jewels on their fingers, but this…? 

Are there fish inside those baubles? Only one way to find out!

The Sharkblood boy grabs the human’s shoulders in his clawed, webbed hands. He carries him up. Up, up, up. There’s a patch of sand and trees on the surface where no humans ever go. If he brings this man to that place, he can sniff him in the night air. Suss out wherever the fish might be hiding. 

So the boy drags the man to a beach. He lays him down on the sand, dragging his own torso on land so he can inspect him thoroughly. 

He rips one of the metal circles off the man's chest and sniffs it. He can’t detect anything. He bites it. The yellow metal twists under his sharp teeth, as soft as fish flesh but not nearly as tasty. He tosses it back into the sea, uninterested. Now he tries a silver one. This one is too hard! It hurts his gums to chew—

A gurgling sound catches his attention. His head whips back to the human, who suddenly spits up a mouthful of seawater. 

He’s alive! 

The Sharkblood boy quickly dives back underwater. A living human! His heart is racing! He’s never encountered a living human before. The clan warns against contact with them. The elders say humans are generally self-serving, individualistic creatures. Clan affiliation among humans is tenuous, based on the boundaries of land where they were born. For merfolk, clanship is integral to their identity. The clan is more important than any one person, and a sense of self cannot exist without affiliation to a tribe. Even if they depart from the group later in life, merfolk from the same clan will never be able to forsake their connection completely. Their bonds are unshakably strong. You cannot erase your clan identity, just as you cannot change the direction of blood flow inside your body. 

Merpeople cannot trust humans because their primary interest is themselves. Any creature without ties to a clan is unspeakable. 

And while the Sharkblood boy trusts his elders and knows that he needs to be wary of humans for this reason, he is also….curious. 

Humans cannot consume seawater. It makes them ill. Is that really true? Interesting...

He peeks out of the water, just the top of his head and his eyes. Watching the human from a reasonable distance.

The man rolls over onto his stomach. He coughs up all the water in his lungs and stomach. Then he collapses face-first in the sand. He is weak. The sea made him weak. He nearly died. 

The Sharkblood boy swims a little closer. If the human is half-dead, then it’s not dangerous. He only wants to see...he wants to learn. What does it mean if a human is adorned in shiny metal trinkets? And, for humans who cannot survive in the ocean...why do they spend so much time on vessels sailing from here to there? 

Why do humans travel? What are they looking for?

The Sharkblood boy has always wondered. But although the rest of the clan can hear his wonderings (they cannot hide thoughts from each other, because they communicate through pictures transmitted directly from head to head), his thoughts go ignored. He is interested and the others are not. 

They do not scorn his interest, nor does he scorn them for not understanding his curiosity. They are simply indifferent. They don’t care about the dissimilarities between them. The Sharkblood boy is, at the end of each day, a Sharkblood. What else matters?

Even so, the boy knows his mind works differently from theirs. When he sees something new (perhaps a human tool or a picture from the mind of someone who has travelled far), he wants to know more. He is curious by nature! He wants to understand the world---he wants to be a part of it! He wants to see things he has never seen before, places no one in his clan has ever been (he can share it with them when he returns!). He wants to know how humans build those structures they sail upon. He wants to know why. 

Why do they risk their lives? What do they want?

The other Sharkbloods are content with a dark cave to sleep in and a mouthful of fish. The boy is happy with those things too, but his mind cannot help roaming. Questioning. Seeking. 

That human on the shore….

The boy swims closer and closer. Until he is within arm’s length of him. 

The man has collapsed. His mouth is muffled against the sand but his shoulders heave as if he’s choking again--

Oh no, he can’t breathe! His mouth is covered by sand and he’s too weak to move!

Moving on instinct, the boy turns him over onto his back. A puff of grainy sand spills from the man’s mouth. Quickly, the mermaid boy wipes his lips clean. Smoothing his face with his cold, wet hand. 

The man frowns under his touch. Is he conscious enough to feel him? Probably not, right? 

In that case…

The boy’s slimy, webbed fingers trail across the man’s beard. In his clan, a beard is a sign of leadership and elevated status. The elder men all have beards, and the elder women braid their hair. It’s tradition. The boy has often seen human men of all ages with beards, though. He wonders if facial hair means the same thing in human culture. 

Touching his beard feels like a strangely intimate thing! The Sharkblood boy quickly retracts his hand, as if he’s been caught doing something against nature. He waits for a moment, and when the man doesn’t stir, when it becomes clear that there is nothing here except the two of them and the light of the moon (the ocean water is silent and contemplative after the storm that just passed)...he puts his fingers back in the hair. 

The man’s facial hair is wiry and coarse to the touch. It’s difficult for the boy to comb his fingers through it. There are still grains of sand stuck in the hair, so the boy takes care to pick them out. He leans closer to the man’s face, observing the lines around his eyes and mouth. Signs of aging, exposure to the sun and harsh winds. 

Curiosity peaked, the mermaid boy leans forward and sniffs his face. The man smells like human, and seawater, since he was just dragged from the depths. There is also another smell. The boy brings his nose closer to the man’s neck. It’s heavy and dark. Like the bark of a tree, but meatier. The boy thinks he has smelled something like it before, but he can’t remember when or where. It smells...natural.

It’s nice. Even though seawater is still by far the strongest smell on him.

It occurs to the boy for the first time that this man would be dead if he had not saved him. He would have drowned in the ocean, unconscious and drifting. The Sharkblood boy saved him by dragging him up here to search for fish snacks. 

He...saved him? The boy glances thoughtfully to the side. He’s never saved anyone or anything before. This happened by accident, but…

A tiny smile appears on his lips. 

He saved him. So that means he gets to keep him, right? Like a pet? Or maybe...maybe he’ll just keep him alive and see what happens. Humans cannot survive on air and seawater. They need freshwater and food.

Suffice to say, the boy knows very little about humans overall. Just the basics and what he’s gleaned from the others in his clan who have had contact with them. The pictures in their heads from these encounters, that now live inside the boy’s head.

He does know that a human’s leg should not be bent at that angle. Looking closer, the boy sees that the man’s leg is...floppy. One leg has a joint in the middle connecting the top to the bottom, and the other the joint is loose. The leg underneath hangs down, suspended by nothing but untethered tendons. He would be bleeding, if the ocean had not washed his blood away. 

That’s for the better, since the Sharkblood boy does not know what the scent of human blood would do to him. He’s already hungry. Perhaps the fresh smell of this man’s blood will make him ravenous, and then he’ll have to eat his pet raw to slate his hunger. 

That would be anticlimactic. No fun. 

So, the mermaid boy decides he should find a way to heal the man. He knows some herbs that can counteract pain. He also has an oily mixture of fish scales, kelp, and shark skin that can be applied to wounds to help them heal faster. 

It’s settled.

He dashes away to gather some ingredients.

_______________

An hour or so later, it is morning. The boy returns to the surface with an armful of ingredients. He is almost surprised to find the man’s body in the same place he left it. Not washed away by the sea, not scavenged by predators along the beach. 

There are seagulls picking at his clothes, though. Nipping the shiny things in their beaks, bedazzled by their charm. The boy understands their confusion---he thought the same thing!---but he does not want the seagulls to get any closer. He shoos them away and leans over the man. Inspecting him once more. 

He holds a finger to the man’s face, feeling the air from his mouth and nose. His breath is uneven and far too soft. He is near death. 

The Sharkblood boy must act fast. 

First, he holds a giant clam filled with fresh water (gathered from a lake hidden in the interior of this small island) to the man’s mouth. It runs down his face. Hmm. He’s too weak to drink on his own. So, the mermaid boy opens his jaw and pours the water inside. Massaging his throat to make him swallow. He chews up some of the leaves that make pain more tolerable and holds his lips to the man’s open mouth. 

Where their lips touch, the boy passes the herbs into his mouth. Again, he rubs his neck to help him ingest.

This feels right. 

He lays a cool hand on the man’s hot forehead. A fever. Probably from the wound. 

The mermaid boy turns his attention to the man’s leg. He applies the oily mixture he retrieved from his own cave. He concocted this himself, years ago. He has not had an occasion to use it very often; he so rarely gets injured. The Sharkbloods are not challenged by the other creatures of the sea. Largely, they are considered apex predators. So the boy applies the mixture quite liberally. 

This man must be in so much pain, the boy thinks. Even in his sleep. Are humans weak to pain? Probably. Their bodies are filled with brittle bones, not the flexible, cartilaginous material the Sharkbloods are made of. In that case, the pain must be awful! 

The boy will try to help as much as he can. He sets the bones with beach reeds. Accurately but carefully. Mimicking the opposite leg for guidance on where the bones should go, generally. 

He believes he’s doing a great job. The boy smiles at his handiwork. 

When he’s done setting the leg, he drags the man’s body underneath a palm frond. The shade will shield him from the sun’s harsh rays. It wouldn’t be good for him to get too much direct sunlight. 

The boy watches the man sleep fitfully. The result of some fever dream, most likely. He strokes his head, trying to think of what else this man might need. 

What other things will keep him alive.

_____________________________

If this is hell, it’s not very impressive. 

In the employ of the governor’s royal navy, Shido has endured his share of hellish toss ups over the years. Once, he and his crew were stuck in the middle of a windless sea for nearly three months. Drifting and drifting, with no breeze to buoy them forward. As their rations began to dwindle, Shido had to actively convince his men that cannibalism would get them nowhere. Luckily, his gift of speech held out long enough for the gods to take pity on them and bring a stiff wind their way. 

On another occasion, Shido found himself facing down the business end of a pirate’s flintlock pistol. He was still under the governor’s charter, but this was...an extra judiciary affair. To advance his career, a man would be foolish not to consider all options. Pirates control a vast amount of uncharted ocean. Shido has made deals with them in the past. Safe passage and bodyguard protection in exchange for riches or clout. Shido is not ashamed of his dealings with pirates (although the governor need not know). With their help in the shadows, he became one of the most renowned sea captains of his time. He considers himself wise for utilizing their unique skill sets.

Even if that does mean he sometimes has to deal with the unsavory parts of a pirate’s disposition. Bound to a pirate ship’s mast, beaten to a pulp, blinking around a black eye and a broken nose, Shido had nothing but his silver tongue to prove his worth. Before the pirates shot him in the face and dumped his body in a watery grave.

“Don’t give in to fear!” Shido had declared. Rallying the miscreants behind his unifying call. “The sea is a cruel mistress! Only the unflinching bonds of strong men can see us through in the end. Stare her down. We are brethren on a not dissimilar voyage! Only a weak, cowardly leader can tear us apart. Too long have you suffered under this tyranny!” He spat some blood on the wooden planks. “Now I ask you, sir, where should you really be pointing your pistol?” 

So that’s how a bullet wound up buried in a pirate captain’s skull instead of Shido’s own. 

Luckily they forgot to gag him, or else he would have been fish food. 

Most sea captains rely on luck. Shido knows that. Luck is not to be discounted when faced with the wrath of the sea and the volatile tempers of unreasonable people. It is a gift to be endowed with good luck. Shido is proud of that, too. In his case, he has luck, pragmatic sense, a charismatic tongue, and a fair amount of raw strength to get him through. So he’s done well for himself. 

Now it seems his luck has finally run out. Ironic that, in the end, it would be his luck---the one thing outside of his control!---that fails him. Strangely fitting. 

To be honest, it really pisses him off. 

If he is indeed dead, if he’s in hell now for all the lives he took and the misdeeds he saw to fruition, then so be it! Shido’s soul burns with a vindictive hatred for the gods that would allow this to happen. Let him face hell! Let hell see what his soul has in store! It is not unlikely that the fire of sheer rage inside Shido rivals the flames of the underworld, if not outmatches it. 

His skin burns like the surface of the sun. So what. Is that all hell can muster? Shido wants to laugh in the face of such meager torments! 

His leg is broken. Unmovable. It feels like his bone is exposed to the sun and sand, grinding against the raw nerves and digging underneath the skin. Shido sweats profusely under the pain, but he forces his mouth into a sneer. A rotting, useless leg? Don’t make him laugh! Give him a peg leg and pray that Shido’s fist doesn’t find you, wherever those contemptible gods of luck may be hiding…

It hurts so bad…

His stomach roils with agony. He wants to vomit but there is nothing save for the burn of salt in his gullet. After drowning. 

Shido remembers drowning. Fading. Choking. Life leaving him bit by bit. He thought death would be a fearful experience, but it was more aggravating than anything. The powerlessness of it all rancored until Shido’s pride relinquished the need to live. In shame. 

Such shame. 

Shido whips his head side to side. His consciousness is slowly returning. He is ashamed of himself. That’s the worst part of this hell so far. Living with failure. Knowing he sent his crew to their deaths. That his ship is destroyed. That he is a disgraced captain, a leader of nothing. 

There is rough sand on the side of his face. He grumbles dispiritedly into the grains, snarling around a burst of emotion that he buries into the sand and refuses to acknowledge.

A cold, wet hand on his face.

The shock of that touch allows Shido to open his eyes. Blinking, unfocused and weak, he sees---

A demon. Reds eyes, pointed ears, and sharp teeth. Claws for fingernails, touching Shido’s face with a gentleness that is actually soothing. It calms the fire in Shido’s skin. Wiping away his tears and bringing a ball of herbs to his lips. 

Shido grunts, beyond words, and lets the demon feed him. He swallows the herbs without question. Closing his eyes against the impending blackness that will soon overtake him.

Hell is laughable. Unimpressive. The stuff of a child’s nightmare, not the biblical apocalypse he’s heard tales about his whole life. 

Even the demons….! 

The demons are soft. Pretty! Shido might go so far as to call this one cute. 

Whatever this demon was meant to do to him, Shido wants to laugh. He finds himself looking forward to the devil’s touch. It is a welcome relief. This creature eases his suffering, especially in his leg. He brings cool water to Shido’s lips and, sometimes, something even softer. Something that feels like a kiss and tastes like painless comfort. 

It takes a full week before Shido is cognizant enough to realize that he is, in fact, still alive.

__________________________________

Humans are more interesting than the Sharkblood boy anticipated. This one mumbles in his sleep, saying a fair amount of words the boy has never heard before. Sounds he needs to train his ears to hear properly. Fascinating noises and articulated grunts. The boy lays on the beach and listens to the noises for hours at a time. Watching the man. Watching and watching. Tending to his wounds and attempting to feed him periodically.

There is also water...water from the eyes? The mermaid boy smears the water from the man’s eyes on his palm and licks it. It’s salty like seawater. Do humans leak seawater from their eyes? Is it a defense mechanism? Incredible! 

The boy’s feathery, fanned tail flaps excitedly in the shallow water. His eager curiosity has fully overtaken him. 

He really likes his new pet! Smiling softly, he wipes the human’s sweat and tries to keep the temperature down. 

________________________________

On the day that Shido’s fever finally breaks, he is able to recognize his surroundings for the first time. 

A blue, cloudless sky above him. Gently lapping waves at his side. He turns his face--slowly, there is an ache pounding against his skull like a claw hammer--and realizes he is on a beach. Blinking, he turns his face the other way. A thin forest of palm trees and vines. 

An island. He’s on an island.

He did not die. 

Shido raises his head and surveys his own body. His limbs are still intact. Two arms, two legs. A set of hands, a set of feet. All of his fingers. The only gaping wound is his right leg. The knee was dislocated and the shin broken. Probably from the force of hitting the water from such a great height as The Ark was capsizing. Shido remembers now. 

He remembers everything. The storm. His ship. His crew. His own soul, torn to shreds with the humiliation of failure. Drowning. 

Except...he survived. His leg---though throbbing distantly and smarting like hell---has been reset with beach reeds. Bandaged. And although Shido is dehydrated (his skin is puffy, mouth dry, and the headache), he has not perished from thirst. 

He’s been cared for. 

It takes several tries for him to rise to his elbows. He glances around the island with greater scrutiny. Nothing but seagulls, crabs, and shrubbery. If he looks hard, he can see to the other side of the island from here. There are no villagers or indigenous people. There is nothing. No one. 

So who…?

A pang of bone-deep pain scrambles Shido’s brains. He collapses back down on the sand. He needs to rest. He can barely move! If there is someone taking care of him, then...will they return?

There was someone, wasn’t there? Shido thinks he remembers...a boy? Or a demon?

He shakes his head. No. He’s not in hell. There are no demons here. No monsters. This is the real world. He’s alive. So then, what on earth did he imagine? 

He lays on the beach, motionless and severely alone, for what feels like hours. Nothing but the vague cry of seagulls and a ringing of mortifying helplessness in Shido’s ears. He needs to find freshwater. Food. He can’t rely on some figment of his imagination---if indeed that’s what saved him---to stay alive. He tries to drag himself further inland. There might be a lake in the forest. Or maybe he can kill one of these crabs to eat...

But Shido is, shamefully, too weak. He manages to drag himself a distance of no more than an inch before he runs out of strength. 

The frustration mixed with the sucker punch to his pride is enough that he feels flaming tears of rage well in his eyes. At least he is strong enough to fight those off. Instead, he screams futilely into the clear blue sky.

“Fuck you, bastards! Motherfuckers!!” He runs through several more curse words before his throat is too dry to continue. 

Laying there, Shido decides he needs to get himself together. He can’t give in to emotion at times like these. He’s seen himself through worse than this before, surely. He’ll manage somehow. 

He will. Certainly. He’ll figure something out. His body might be betraying him, but he still has his wits! He needs to think...he needs…

Water splashes demurely near his feet. He opens his eyes and sees---

A boy. Or something like it. A pale-skinned creature with brownish red eyes (dull and lightless, as if the soul inside of him is a distant thing) crawls onto the sand. It holds a giant clam in its hands. Indeed, its fingers are webbed and clawed. 

It wasn’t a dream. Or a hallucination. This creature is….?

The boy lifts Shido’s head and brings the clam to his lips. Fresh, blessedly chilled water! Shido gulps it down with help from the creature. He drinks his fill then flops back onto the sand, dizzy with relief. 

A pinch of herbs arrives at his lips and Shido swallows it automatically. His body already knows what to do. This creature, this thing from the sea, has been tending to him for a while, it seems. When Shido swallows the leaves, he feels quite a bit stronger. Enough that he can actively watch the creature inspecting his leg. It slathers some kind of grease on the wound, easing the tortured flesh. 

Fins. There are red fins on this boy’s body where there should be ears. Crimson ruffles poke through his soft, tan hair. His skin is as pale as untouched sand. And scales. Shiny silver spots dazzle beneath the sun here and there across his body. Random places. His shoulders, parts of his back, his neck, his face. Further down, where a waist and legs should be, Shido catches a glimpse of solid, scaled silver. Like the body of a snake. Or…

A fish. 

It can’t be. 

A shock of pain startles him out of his staring. The creature is adjusting the seaweed wrappings around Shido’s knee. He grits his teeth to bear it, grateful that this creature seems to know enough about healing to ward off infection. This thing is…

Helping him?

Sweating and panting against the pain, Shido lifts himself onto his elbows and regards the thing head on. Like a man. He should introduce himself, shouldn’t he? 

“Thank you…”

At the sound of his voice, the creature jolts in fear. Eyeing Shido with open-mouthed surprise. And yes, there they are. Teeth as sharp as a shark’s. Jagged and deadly. Shido’s face falls in seriousness. His fingers itch for the grip of his pistol, which was lost in the wreck, and which defended him well all these years.

But, somehow, the creature seems to be afraid of _him_! Of Shido! With a flash of silver and red as dark as blood, it dives back into the ocean. 

Shido blinks disorientedly. 

“Wait…!” he calls to the sea. “I...are you still there?” He pulls himself into a sitting position. Feeling more like a man now. (And if he’s a man, then that thing is a…. He knows the word. But it feels ridiculous on his tongue!)

“It’s alright,” Shido continues. Gazing at the water where the boy disappeared. “I won’t hurt you. I just wanted to thank you. I would have died out there and you…” 

It saved him. _Why_ did it save him?

Shido has to know! He doesn’t like owing people things. Buying something without a price tag. If this fish creature saved him, Shido wants to know right now what needs to be done to repay him. Is he expected to stay on this island? Some kind of prisoner? Is the fish fattening him up to eat him? Those fangs. Shido has known men with flatter teeth that would chew him up without a second thought. 

Even though there is a kernel of gratitude in his heart, yearning to become a blossom when he looks at that boy’s white skin and deft hands, his silver-spotted cheeks as round as a peach, Shido knows better than to throw gratitude to the winds. 

He also knows better than to reveal his suspicions when he holds the losing hand. 

He calls out again. “I’d like to talk. If you’ll let me. At least grant me the dignity of meeting my savior face to face.” 

He waits. 

In time, a sliver of a face appears out of the water. Tan hair and wide red eyes. Curious. 

Well, well. Don’t they write songs about these creatures’ curiosity? And also, their murderous intent. A dagger hidden behind a seductive smile. Indeed. 

Shido hardens his heart and hones his face into a welcoming smile. “Hello,” he offers. “I’m Captain Shido Masayoshi of the Governor’s Royal Navy, first fleet command. Thank you for saving my life.” 

If this creature knows anything of human society, he’ll recognize some of those words. Surely. And if he’s reasonable at all, the boy will know an opportunity when he sees one. Shido is counting on it. 

The fish creature peers out of the water. Staring with gentle eyes. Lips slightly parted with interest. He says nothing. 

“What is your name?” Shido asks. 

The boy blinks. No response. 

Shido waits longer than customary, beginning to question whether or not this thing can understand human speech at all. If it can’t, then he’s fucked.

Taking a deep breath, Shido decides on a different approach. He extends his hand and says, “Anyway, I’d like to greet you properly. As men, since it seems you’re a young man yourself. And you must know of my people’s custom---”

He thinks maybe what this mermaid---that’s what it is, a mermaid, alright---wants to be treated like a human. It’s what Shido would expect, if their roles were reversed! Surely all subhuman creatures desire a place at the table of humanity’s banquet! Civilization and such. Getting on this creature’s good side would be wise, because Shido does not have a way to defend himself just yet. Later on, he can always fashion a rock into a rudimentary knife and stab him in the back if need be, but for now….

His plan backfires. The mermaid boy clearly does not understand his gesture. He dives back into the ocean the second Shido reaches out a hand. Escaping. 

“Wait, come back!” Skittish little thing, isn’t it? 

Shido calls to it again and again to no avail. Giving up, he curses foully under his breath and decides to leave it alone for now. That mermaid has disappeared. It can come and go as it pleases. 

Unlike Shido. Who is trapped. 

Thanks to its help, though (whatever its motives), Shido feels strong enough to pull himself in the direction of the reeds. He plucks one from the sand and begins sharpening it against a rock. The soft wood might be able to pierce a crab’s shell. Shido is _starving_. He needs to eat to stay alive and allow his body to mend. 

Raising his makeshift spear, Shido crawls after a crab in a distressingly comical attempt to capture one. He’s far too loud and slow. The crab skitters away effortlessly, Shido’s spear meets only sand.

“Stay still, damn it,” he curses. Temper flaring as he loses the last crab on the beach. 

Hopeless. He holds a hand to his empty stomach, willing the hunger pangs away. His tattered uniform fits him so loosely. He’s grown thin. 

Pathetic. 

Suddenly, he hears something soft land on the sand next to his head. The headless body of a fish. Spine ripped out. Shido pokes the fish---it’s fresh! 

Ravenous, he peels the scales off the fish with his bare hands and shoves the meat into his mouth. He shouldn’t eat so much raw fish right away, but. He needs nourishment. The rawness won’t kill him, but starvation definitely will. 

This raw, headless fish might be the most delicious he’s ever eaten. 

Another fish lands at his side. Seemingly dropped from the heavens. Shido swallows his food, bones and all, and stuffs this one in his face as well. He needs to slow down. He needs to let his body adjust…

Where are these coming from? 

Now there’s another. Tail still twitching as half its spine still remains. Shido watches the landing this time. It came from the sea.

Sure enough, when Shido looks, he sees the boy. Head and shoulders above the water, chewing noisily on a fishead. Slurping up a spine as if feasting on noodles. It makes eye contact with Shido and tosses him another fish, licking an eyeball off its clawed thumb. 

“...Thank you, again,” Shido says, patting his belly in satisfaction. “Glad you came back.” 

This time, the boy offers him a tiny, sharp toothed smile.

It’s not adorable. It’s monstrous. 

...Even if it is, a little bit, adorable.

____________________________________ 

The Sharkblood boy will admit that he was caught completely off guard when his human woke up. He didn’t think the man would regain consciousness so soon! He hadn’t planned for it yet. Maybe part of him thought the man might never wake up and the boy could just diligently tend to his unconscious body forever---

When the man spoke to him, the Sharkblood boy was afraid. He’d never spoken to a human before! Never communicated with anyone or anything that doesn’t live in the sea. All the clan’s fears about humans immediately overtook the boy again. He saw the man seeing him. Looking back at him with eyes that can really _see._ That know the boy for what he is. 

He fully thought about leaving and never returning.

But the man called to him. The Sharkblood boy recognizes a word or two of human speech (thanks to his shared memories with other clan members who have conversed with humans in the past). 

‘Wait.’ ‘Thank.’ ‘Talk.’ 

The man was not brutish or cruel. Not a slavering monster like the elders said. He spoke slowly and calmly. Regarding him with bright, intelligent eyes that recognize more than what floats on the surface. The Sharkblood boy likes the man’s eyes. He thought maybe it would be alright if he took another quick look, from a safe distance…

The man was waiting for him. Of course he was. Where else would he go? He can’t walk on his hobbled leg. 

The man still might die without the Sharkblood boy’s help. 

So he must help him. Now that the man is aware, a whole world of possibilities has opened to the Sharkblood boy. Things for him to see and learn! He doesn’t intend to get too close, though---his fins writhed in shock when the man tried to touch him (touching! So soon! Disgusting! Are humans nothing more than brood mares and livestock? Merfolk regard physical touch of any kind as a highly intimate experience, meant for sexual partners and moments of intense closeness). No one has ever tried to touch the Sharkblood boy before, not even the elders or his closest companions in the clan. He doesn’t have a bond like that with anyone. The idea of physical touch is completely foreign to the boy. He hopes the human doesn’t try something like that again…

That aside, it was funny watching the man try and fail to spear a crab. His injuries make him clumsy. The Sharkblood boy laughed underwater as he watched. 

If the man wants to catch crabs, then he must eat fish. Good. The boy eats fish, too! He can catch them for him. 

When he appears again, the man appears relieved to see him. Almost happy, after he finishes eating. He was starving and now his belly is full. That’s a joyful feeling, the boy knows. 

He’s glad that he was able to give the man such a feeling.

So, he watches. 

_____________________________________

That night, Shido manages to get a fire going. He knows enough about survival in the wilderness to keep himself alive on this tiny island. The leaves and reeds make great fire fodder. He feeds the fire cautiously until he has enough flame to roast the fish given to him by the mermaid boy. 

He eats well. 

The boy watches his every move from a safe distance. Floating in the water next to a large rock. Observing. Relentless in its ogling, barely even blinking. It doesn’t seem interested in moving, but it throws him fish every now and then when it looks like Shido is running low. 

So Shido feels like an animal in a cage being fed by its master. But, at the very least, he’s a well-cared for beast. Truly, Shido has been worse. 

He holds a freshly fried skewer out to the boy. “Would you like some?”

The mermaid submerges himself further in the water. Only his nose and eyes remain visible. 

Shido shrugs and chews the fish himself. Crunching on bones. “Suit yourself. I suppose you don’t eat cooked fish, really. Since you live in the sea...” 

He’s rambling. Speaking mostly to himself at this point. He’s starting to accept that this boy cannot understand him at all. Which is less than ideal. Still, Shido is tired and strungout. He wants to talk. Perhaps the creature knows more than he’s letting on. It would be nice to hope for that.

“Is this your home?” he asks. Not expecting an answer. “Do you live on this island? Or, around it?” 

Shido lays down against a rock and feels the weight of his situation settle into his shoulders. How the hell is ever going to get off this island? 

He has no plan. He has no ship. He has no crew. 

He has nothing. 

“How did you find me, anyway? I wonder how deep in the ocean I fell.” He closes his eyes and leans his head back on the rock. Resting. 

His body is still recovering. He has plenty of time to think of a plan while he waits for his full strength to return. The feeling of a satisfied stomach makes his brain work slowly, anyway. 

Shido smirks, already very near sleep. “I guess it’s just lucky that you found me. Hmph. Maybe my luck hasn’t run out after all.” 

“Luck….y…”

Eyes wrenched open, Shido whirls around to face the voice. It’s delicate---soft like a whisper, but gravelly and rough around the edges. A serrated knife dipped in honey. Dripping sweetness, barbed and distinctly inhuman underneath. 

The boy has come closer. Leaning on the other side of the rock Shido is resting upon. He continues to stare, naturally, but there is something gentler to him that Shido did not notice when he first looked at him. The mermaid’s face is a plump little apple. Perky. His eyes are not human---they are muted and glassy like an animal’s---even so...there is such emotion in those eyes. Profound intent. Everything this creature has done is purposeful; he means to be here. Helping Shido. He’s making a decision with a rational mind. 

Oh, thank the gods! Being in the company of another rational creature is such a relief! It feels like a downpour of blessed rain upon Shido’s bald head. Maybe the gods have not forsaken him after all! 

“Did you just speak?” Shido asks. He knows what he heard. He wants to hear it again. 

“Luh...luh...ck. Eeee.” The boy smiles very wide. His teeth glint in the firelight. But Shido is too distracted to look at those teeth. He’s looking at the eyes. “Luck. Luck? Luckeee.” He laughs. It’s a heaving, breathless laugh that sounds more like a keen heard inside a madhouse.

Yet Shido finds himself smiling in return. “That’s...right,” he encourages. “Lucky. I am lucky that you found me.” 

As his laughter dies down, the mermaid nods. He lays his head on his folded arms, sprawling out across the rock. Staring at Shido like he’s the most interesting thing in the entire world. Like there is nowhere else he’d rather be than right here, entertaining himself on this unnamed plot of sand in the middle of the ocean. Watching Shido. Swishing his tail contentedly in the ocean as he observes. Not a care in the world. 

Shido huffs a soft chuckle. Well, if he has nothing else, at least he has this mermaid boy. Unflinchingly fascinated by whatever he sees in Shido. Dedicated to making sure Shido’s needs are met. 

Ridiculous as it is, Shido is grateful. He lets his kernel of gratitude grow a little. A small, tender sprout peeks its head out of the barren earth of his battleworn heart. 

Lucky. Yeah. 

Maybe he really is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love Shido in this setting <3 <3 And could Ninchi be any cuter?
> 
> Stay tuned for Chapter 2 (the pr0n).


	2. Awash

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There is very little to do on the island that keeps Shido occupied.
> 
> Except one thing. One very important thing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tags have changed! 
> 
> I mean, we all know why we're here ;) Enjoy the spicy tuna roll special!

**Chapter Two: Awash**

Shido’s strength returns to him a little at a time. He marks the days by carving notches into the bark of a tree. It takes a month for him to be able to stand on his own feet, leaning on a rock. Then another month to be able to walk. He’s hobbled, assuredly. He will probably have something of a limp for the rest of his life. 

But he’s alive. His body was able to recuperate, under the watchful eyes of the mermaid boy. 

During those two months when Shido still has very limited mobility, he relies on the mermaid boy for nearly everything. The boy is good at catching fish, so Shido has fish for breakfast, dinner, and lunch. It’s nutritious, if a little...repetitive. One day, he asks the boy to bring him something else and is honestly surprised when he returns from the ocean’s depths with a handful of fish eggs and seaweed. (Shido eats the eggs but leaves the shrubbery. He’s not that desperate yet.) 

It seems the boy can understand Shido’s speech. Limitedly, perhaps. Still. It’s a welcome blessing. 

“Home,” Shido enunciates slowly. Drawing a picture in the sand of a rudimentary house. “This is where humans live. In homes. Is there anything like this around here?” He needs to find civilization. Other humans. His sense of direction is completely skewed without his compasses and maps. 

The boy looks closely at the picture. The tip of his tail slips above and below the water in thoughtful excitement. “Home?” he repeats, head tilted to one side. “Your home?” 

Shido nods. “Yes. Or, something like that. Where can I find other humans in homes like these?” He adds a few stick figures to the drawing. Indicating people with two legs. 

The boy thinks for a moment. Then, using his sharp claws, he draws something in the sand. It looks like a wavy sort of circle. “My home,” he announces brightly. Patting the tap of his own drawing with pride. 

Shido stares at his work. “Oh. I see. That’s where you live?” 

“Mm!” Nodding happily, the boy scrapes out the middle of the circle. Digging to the darker, wet sand underneath. “Dark,” he says. “C...c…?” His head rolls to one side, searching for a word. Eventually he gives up and simply clarifies, “No light.” 

“A cave,” Shido offers. Reading the mermaid’s scaly face with quiet fascination. “Do you live in a cave?” 

His tail slaps the water eagerly. “Cave! Yes. I live in a cave.” He points to the sea. “There. In the water.”

His speech is getting better! He mimics the words and phrases Shido uses and begins to speak using sentences. His vocabulary is still very limited, but honestly...there is something endearing about that as well. 

A low hum of pride washes through Shido’s chest whenever he teaches the boy something new. He’s proud of himself for being able to teach the creature to speak. Proud of the boy for learning so quickly. It pleases him that they’re able to communicate better, the more time they spend together. 

And since Shido cannot go anywhere and the mermaid seems content to linger at his side indefinitely, they do spend quite a lot of time together. 

Shido asks the question about other humans several more times. Each time, the boy’s answers take a different direction. He genuinely seems not to know anything about where humans live. Even in relation to the island. So Shido lets it go. 

He’ll have to find some other way of rejoining civilization. Given time. Of which Shido has a disturbingly unlimited supply. 

___________________________

“Name.  _ Name _ .” Shido holds a hand to his own chest. They’ve been over this several dozen times, but they still haven’t been able to arrive at any kind of conclusion. “My name is Captain Shido Masayoshi. And…” he points to the boy, who is staring at him with wide, curious eyes. “...you are?” 

It is raining today. Shido has made it clear to the boy that humans cannot be out in the rain unprotected for long periods of time (which the boy found endlessly amusing, watching Shido hold a palm frond over his head in the pouring rain, a fruitless attempt at keeping himself dry). When his laughter stopped, the boy began swimming along the shore. Looking over his shoulder every so often. As if he expected Shido to follow. Wobbling on unsteady legs, Shido tottered across the beach until they came to a small outcropping of rocks. It serves as a cave in poor weather. 

It’s Shido’s makeshift home. He has protection from the elements here, although it is permanently damp. He sits on the edge of the shoreline, covered by eroded rocks, and tries to get the boy to tell him his name. 

He doesn’t know why he’s so interested in knowing. Truthfully, he doesn’t know why he’s so interested in the boy at all. It might be because the boy’s presence is the only thing keeping him sane. Shido is a busy person. He cannot be idle with his own thoughts, especially when his thoughts are so dismal and discouraging as of late. He needs to have something to focus his energy. 

Graciously, the boy’s inquisitiveness provides such an outlet. Shido finds himself casting around for topics, things to talk about with him. Things to teach. He’s taught him the words for foods, plants, nature, everything on the island. Now they’re moving on to broader, more abstract concepts. 

Realistically, their interactions are a necessity as well. Shido hopes his conversation will keep the boy interested. Because if the mermaid’s interest wanes, he could just as easily swim off and leave Shido to fend for himself. Which would be...potentially ruinous. 

The rain patters on the side of the rocks and Shido jabs a finger in his own chest. “Me.  _ My _ name. I’m Captain Shido. What is your name? You.” He points at the boy, who flinches expectedly. 

He seems averse to any kind of touch, except when it comes time for Shido to be healed. And even then, his touch is sparing at best, making sure to only touch the reeds and the herbs covering Shido’s wounds, instead of his skin directly. Shido remembers---he thinks he remembers, he could have sworn---hands. Hands on his forehead. On his face, along his beard. Lips, he remembers lips. Why does he remember kissing this boy in a hazy fever dream? Did he imagine it? 

How could he have imagined it, when he knew nothing of this boy’s existence? 

Shido is sure the boy used to touch him. But now that he is conscious and aware, the boy does not. Shido can only guess at why

Often, he looks at the boy’s webbed hands and recalls what they felt like on his skin. Such vivid memories. He cannot help wondering what would happen if he took the boy’s hand and placed it on his cheek---

Shido refrains from doing so. He’d love to---yes, he  _ certainly _ would---but he needs the boy’s approval to remain at his side. So he cannot do anything rash. 

(This is difficult for him. Shido’s nature has always been rash by default, especially when it comes to things he wants. Even if wanting the boy’s touch, missing it, is something that perhaps he should leave to the side and never entertain again. Fortunately, he can be prudent when the need arises. ...Well. Prudent to an extent.) 

“What should I call you?” he asks yet again. Eyes travelling up the whimsical pattern of scales on the boy’s arms. 

The boy hums, his mouth curved into a frown. He doesn’t understand. His lips open and close rapidly, making a soft sputtering noise. Shido has come to know what this means. He wants Shido to say more. Explain.

“I don’t know how else to explain it.” Shido rubs his eyes tiredly. The sound of rain against the choppy ocean stretching out around him on all sides is as nerve wracking as it is soporific. There’s a lullaby quality to the sound. Or maybe it’s Shido’s nerves lulling him to drowsiness. 

He lies down on his side, running a hand through his beard. The dull itchiness of continued unrest is wearing on him. Shido is frustrated. In his situation (stranded, no ship, making a bed out of stone, abrasive sand, and briny seawater), in his sedentary existence. In his interactions with the mermaid, which can be challenging when they hit a wall like this. 

“Hmmmm….” The boy makes a low humming noise. He swims to Shido’s side. Locking eyes with him in that undaunted way he has. “You. You are....human? Human. You are. Yes? No?” 

Shido nods wearily. “Yes I’m a human.” He sighs and mumbles under his breath, “And you’re a fucking mermaid. Hallelujah, praise the angels’ merry sweet tits.” 

Intrigue lights the boy’s eyes. “Mm? Tits? Sweee...sweet tits?” 

“No, no!” Shido waves a hand in front of his face. Damn, why did this boy have to hear that of all things? “Don’t say that. I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have…” 

“Tits. Tits tits tits tits tits….tits...tiiiiitsss..” Instead of listening, now the boy is playing with the word as he does when he thinks it sounds funny. 

Shido sighs. God forsake him. He really is a heathen, teaching naughty words to innocent sea creatures. If there was any question where he might end up when he dies, paradise or inferno, the answer is surely fixed now. 

“Tits tits...sweeeeet tiiittssss…” 

Low rumbling laugher bubbles out of Shido unexpectedly. He starts laughing and suddenly he can’t stop. He sees now how utterly hilarious all of this is. Every last bit of it! 

This is insanity. Pure madness. Shido doesn’t know if he’ll make it out of this alive!

But goddamn. Hearing this mermaid say the word ‘tits’ is funny. 

He laughs until tears spring to his eyes. Not understanding one bit, the mermaid laughs along with him. That baying howl of his. Shido finds that noise funny, too. So he laughs until his body has nothing left. 

He feels much better when he’s done. The boy is propping his chin on one scaly hand, regarding Shido with such enthusiasm. Shido stares back. He feels empty, awash with something purer and more primal. He offers the creature a smile in return. 

“Tits?” the boy asks, like it’s an honest question. 

“Yeah, that’s right,” Shido says with a haughty sneer. (Fuck it, he’s already going to hell isn’t he?) “Tits. A nice big pair of them. Bouncing and swaying in the breeze.” He chuckles darkly, jerking his chin in the direction of the boy’s chest. “Where are yours?”

Confused, the boy pats his own flat chest. He’s lost. 

Seriously, though. Aren’t mermaids supposed to be women? Isn’t that what all the songs say? How come Shido couldn’t get saved by a mermaid with her tits out, long hair and a gentle voice as bewitching as the sea. Two arms spread wide open for him. 

Instead, he has this… Shido’s shrewd eyes regard the boy in his totality. 

This boy has a blank, round face, with teeth like those on a wild beast. His visage is permanently one step away from a huge, sunshiney smile or the snapping jaws of a predator. He has a thin frame with the square shoulders of a teenage boy. Some slim muscles on his arms and chest, but his waist is almost womanish. Very slight. His skin is porcelain white. Water from the rain and sea slides down his body. Chest, nipples, bony ribs, and flat stomach. He’s always wet in some way. The water clings to him like a second skin, sparkling across his scales and making them dazzle when they catch the sun just right. His tiny nipples are frequently hard, Shido notices. Pebbling against the wetness and roughness of the world. Those little nipples have never known clothes. They would definitely poke sweetly against Shido’s palm if he rubbed them. 

The boy is skinny, small-boned, and naked. Shido’s sneer turns into a smile as he leers. 

Actually, he’s alright with what he got.

________________________________

Shido points to his drawing in the sand again. “When the trees go through a full cycle….” he gestures to the four different trees he drew, “...we call that a year. It’s how seasons pass. Time.” 

He’s going out of his mind with boredom here. Still not able to move very much. Now he’s inexplicably teaching the boy about the passage of time. Since Shido feels as if he’s been on this island for several years already, even though not two months have passed. 

The mermaid boy peers studiously at his drawing. “Why?” he asks Shido eventually. “Why does time happen?” 

He’s always asking why. How. When. This boy wants to learn. He wants to know everything. And he’s a fast learner. 

Shido likes that about him.

“Well, scientists believe it has to do with the planets. You know, the earth. The thing we all live on.” He draws a picture of the earth. “Rotations around the sun. So I guess that’s why.” 

The mermaid boy’s eyes are wide and his face has gone slack. He’s overwhelmed. “Wow...earth. Planet? Are there other planets, too?” 

Smiling, Shido nods. He can almost forget about his two months of complete inaction when he looks at this boy’s face. How far he’s progressed with speech. With his understanding of the world outside the ocean. “That’s right,” he tells him. “Some humans have seen them. With a long tube of glass that can see very far in the sky.” 

The boy’s fins peek out of water and his tail twitches excitedly. “I would like to see, too! Can you show me?” 

“I don’t have my telescope here, but….yes. Some day, I will show you. If you want.” That earns Shido a contented grin and a happily splashing caudal fin. 

This boy…

Shido is sure the full width of his smile is obvious, even underneath his mustache. Does the boy see it? Can he read it for what it is? 

He wonders what the boy would do if he could. If he understood. Would he be flattered that Shido is growing so fond of him? Would he take it as a compliment? He should! Shido doesn’t generally like other people, even humans. Perhaps,  _ especially _ humans. Shido thinks humans are, for the most part, weak, vain, lazy sheep that constantly need to be led by the nose. He thinks humanity has lost its spirit in the modern age, its collective will to live. Now people are just meandering through life. Complacent and small-minded. 

In this boy, though, Shido sees a kind of fascination that he has never seen before. This boy’s thirst for knowledge is endearing. He wants things, genuinely and sincerely! Everything this boy wants can be gleaned from his face. He’s a young man with desires. Real ones. An interest in the world that speaks to a love of life. 

Shido has never met anyone content in their existence before. Not like this boy. Maybe it’s because he’s not human. Or maybe it’s because he’s young.

Although…

“How old are you?” Shido asks automatically. He has been wondering. 

“Old?” The boy blinks. “But I am...young?”

“No, that’s not what I mean.” He should slow down. Start from the beginning. “Humans measure their age in years. How many years they’ve been alive. So what I’m asking is, how about you? How many years have you been alive?” 

“Ah, years!” The boy nods. “Now I know. We count years, too, but it’s...different. I don’t know your numbers…” His mouth turns downward, disappointed. It’s true; he only knows up to ten. But somehow the boy makes it work. His face lights up when he figures out a way to explain. “I am ten years ten times, twice!” 

Shido quickly does the math. “Wait…you’re two hundred years old?” 

It takes a few minutes to catch the boy up on some numeration specifics. When he has a concept of ‘hundred’ he confirms Shido’s questions. 

“Yes. Two hundred. Still young for us.” He rolls onto his back. Lackadaisical. Playful, even. As if he hasn’t just blown Shido’s mind!

“Two hundred is young for your people?” How can that be? No one ever heard of mermaids living that long….or at all, in fact. So technically anything could be true. 

Stretching his arms over his head, yawning, the boy continues. “Yes. The oldest of us is four times me. Eight...hundred? And some more years too.” 

A lifespan of eight hundred years?! Incredible! 

It’s probably good that humans don’t know about mermaids’ long lifespans. They would poach them and drink their blood through a straw if they thought it would help them live half as long as this young man has. 

This is mysterious and strange. Shido shakes his head. “So you’ve been alive for that long. You must have seen so many things in your life already…” How does a person even spend two hundred years of life? Doing what exactly?

The boy shakes his head. “Not many things. Some things. I have never seen those…” He points to the sky. “Planets.” 

“Well, yes, but…” The planets in the sky seem like a pedantic, inconsequential thing against a lifespan of eight hundred years or more. Shido doesn’t know how to explain that.

He looks around at the island he’s been stranded upon. A tiny speck of land in a vast ocean. In order for there to be creatures living so very long under the sea, there must be a whole world down there! A society even. This boy and his brethren would be able to travel the world over and over again with the time they have…

...And yet, this boy is spending months at a time with Shido. Nursing him back to health. Tossing him fish like a creature in a zoo.

“Isn’t this boring for you?” Shido asks, nearly biting his tongue off in embarrassment and stilted frustration. “I mean, there is not much to see on this island…”

“Boring?” The boy rises from the beach, a length of sand stuck to his back. “I should not...want?” 

Shido clicks his teeth. He feels cowed, very aware of how much he has been depending on the boy. And how little he gives in return. Compared to an ancient being like this, what is a man? Shido feels more like a toy soldier given to a child for amusement. A plaything. A pet.

“You can want whatever you please,” he says slowly. Evenly. Allowing each word to ring true. “Although I’ll admit, I don’t understand why you’d want to be here.”

A heavy, stricken look settles on the boy’s face. His dorsal fin sags. He drags himself closer to the water, but he doesn’t jump in. He scoops some seawater in his hand and stares at it. 

For a while, there is only the sound of softly lapping waves against the shore. Rhythmic and constant. 

Then, in a small voice, the boy asks, “...Angry? Are you...angry? At me?” 

Shido closes his eyes. He feels as though he has a right to be angry (he always does), but in that moment he honestly isn’t. “No, I’m not angry. Why would I be. You’ve done nothing wrong.” 

The boy turns back to him, face wide open with hope. “Not wrong?” 

“No.” A stab of guilt (uncommon to say the least) hits Shido square in the chest. He does not want to upset the boy. He prefers him in a peppier mood. Inquisitive and studious. Eyes fixated on Shido. 

But, there is something bothering him about all this…

“Why did you save me, though?” he asks. At last. “Why are you so interested in humans? You will probably outlive us all. Why do you want to know about us so badly? I mean, you’ve stayed with me this long...” Nearly two months. It just doesn’t make sense.

“Why?” The mermaid boy swims back and forth. Taking time to organize his words. Eventually, he comes back to lay on the beach. Staring at Shido intently. “Because I...want to. I want to know. I  _ want _ to.” 

He sounds like a child demanding ice cream. And even though Shido generally hates children, he finds this little act...cute. Because instead of ice cream, the boy is demanding time with Shido. 

That is appealing. Determination looks good on his scaly face. Shido wishes he could cup one cheek in his hand and smooth his thumb over those furrowed brows…

“I like.” The boy is still talking! “I like...this. I like. You. I like you. And this and here. I like being here with you.” 

So soft. Those words are so desperately soft! Sweet cream and cushy pillows! That’s how soft those words are! Shido is blindsided by them and he finds---his heart skips a beat. 

This boy. This boy, this boy. What is he doing to Shido? His cuteness? His eagerness and forthright attitude? 

Shido holds a hand to his chest and regards him with a smile. “I see. Well, then. I’m honored.” 

That’s true. He is honored. After all, a creature this old and this beautiful (come on, is Shido supposed to pretend he doesn’t have eyes? Ignore the blossoming, ethereal beauty of this boy’s lithe body? Be reasonable; Shido is only a man!), choosing to spend their time here, of all places? With Shido, of all people? 

Damn. 

Shido really does like this kid. He knew there was a reason. 

___________________________________

The Sharkblood boy does not think to question anything that he’s doing, until the man does. Before that, he was very content with his choices! Making sure the man is fed, healthy, and able to survive in spite of the fact that he cannot move very much. Plus, the boy got to learn about many human things! Words and thoughts and ideas. His ears are used to human speech now, and his tongue is getting there. 

The boy loves looking at the man and  _ seeing _ . For once, the boy is seeing a world outside of his own. The sea is home, and it is wonderful in its own way, but the man knows about things beyond! He knows about the world and how it works. The whys and hows. Planets. Machines. Pieces of wood connected to each other that can move something as big as a ship, like the one the man used to be on. He used to steer that ship, didn’t he? So he said.

It’s amazing! The boy wishes he could see the man commanding a ship. Using his smart inventions to control an enormous structure. He would love to see the man in such control! It seems to fit him. He has a quiet kind of dignity about him. He says things, and hides others. There are things he wants the boy to know and things he doesn’t. Open things and hidden things.

The boy is very, very intrigued by the man’s hidden things. 

Among the boy’s clan, there are no hidden things. Everyone knows everything all at once when you speak because they share a common mind. When the boy returns to his clan after several weeks away, they are not surprised to see him. Nor concerned by his absence. Merfolk in their clan come and go as they please. Besides, when they see the boy again, they know instantly about the human man he is keeping on the island and how he is caring for him. The elders frown, wagging their heads in a dismissive way. But no one really seems to care. The clan feasts on the dead body of a whale and everything else becomes irrelevant. 

It’s different with the human. His ideas are said with words spoken from a mouth. So he chooses what to say and what not to say. It’s a devilish kind of excitement, not knowing what he is going to say next! The boy finds himself obsessed with knowing all the things the man might not say. The things he wants to keep to himself. 

The Sharkblood boy wants to know!

But when the man asks him (in an unsatisfied tone which the boy does not like) why he saved him….it takes a long moment for the boy to answer.

Why did he? 

Well, it was because of the fish! He thought there would be snacks in those shiny things…(they’re called ‘medals’ apparently, for people who have done something important. It doesn’t surprise the boy that the man has done important things. He must be a special human, to be allowed to steer a ship!). After that, he was just curious. And after that…

After that...now…

The Sharkblood boy doesn’t know. He’s never had to make conscious decisions before, everything has always been decided by the clan, so he is a little surprised in his own ability to make a choice. Now that he is choosing something so unorthodox, so definite---keeping a man alive for weeks on end is a choice the boy makes constantly---he must have a reason. A real  _ reason _ .

Reason…? The boy thinks. His reason is...because he couldn’t  _ not _ do it. He couldn’t let the man die and he still can’t. He’d never abandon him. Never! He’d never let a man as special and interesting and kind (the man is so kind, teaching the boy all his human things) go away. Slip through his fingers. 

No. 

It’s not allowed. 

The boy sees inside of himself for the very first time, understanding that he is his own person. Not just a Sharkblood, but a person in his own right! He is a person and he  _ wants _ . He wants to stay with the man. He wants the man to get better so he can show the boy more things. 

The man is not a pet to the boy anymore. Now he’s…special. Close. 

Friend. Is that the word? Or is there another one…

Family. Family is, the boy learns from the man, a mother and a father. Brothers, sisters. The person who gave birth to you is a mother and the man who gave his seed is the father. The people who have the same mother and father are siblings. Humans have families like that.

In the clan, there are no families. People create and lay eggs (women and men can fill either role, since most merfolk have ambiguous sexual organs), and when the eggs hatch, the clan raises the children together. As one. The boy doesn’t know which people in the clan created his egg together. He never thought about it. A concept of a mother---a special person who gave birth to you and raised you from a baby---and a father...a man who is invested in your growth because he has ownership of his own seed? Or because...he loves? 

Something flutters and beats inside the boy when he thinks about a family’s love. Something far more intense than the boy has ever felt before. 

Love is...partnership, right? Two people choosing to mate? In the boy’s clan, partnerships are a staple. Sexual intercourse is rare and when it does happen, the pair will never separate. Their bodies have chosen. They will only mate with that one person for the rest of their lives. Love, as the boy knows it, is a concept talked about in relation to these partnerships. For this reason, merfolk disapprove of casual touching. A chosen partnership is an important, serious matter. It is integral to the clan because children come from partnerships. In the nest during mating season, all the eggs are mixed together. No one knows whose eggs belong to whom. So the love of a partnership is monodirectional. Focused solely between the partners. Everyone raises all children, but it is not a feeling of love that drives the act as much as it is survival. The only instance of love one can experience is through a chosen partnership. 

The boy is at an age where he can choose a mate for himself if he likes. But merfolk are not insistent about this. It’s a natural process that cannot be forced. Some choose early, some late. Some never choose at all. It happens when your body decides it wants another. The boy has not felt that way yet and he’s never really imagined what it might feel like when he does….

But the idea of love. He’s never, ever thought love could be more than just a partnership. A shared thing between mates and their offspring. A biological predisposition, as well as a choice. Mothers tending to babies. Fathers seeing their offspring grow strong. Mothers and fathers loving each other and creating something out of love.

Such a wild, foreign concept. 

Thrumming insistence flows through the boy like blood through a vein. Rippling down his scales. It’s a feeling similar to want, but brighter. Harder to ignore. Persistent. Lingering. The boy…

The boy yearns. 

He experiences yearning for the first time when he thinks about love. When he thinks about the man giving love like that. Is the man a father? The boy doesn’t want him to be! He wants…

Actually, he doesn’t know what he wants. He thinks the man fulfilling the role of a father would be beautiful. But he doesn’t want the man to be a father yet. Not yet! Not yet because…

Wiping his face clean of oily whale blood, smearing the grease from the creature’s fat onto his fingers, the boy thinks. He ponders his own body. His feelings. He thinks that maybe this is...could it be? 

Could it? 

The yearning sits in his stomach and waits. Bides its time. The boy tries not to think about it too much, but he knows it is there. A light that refuses to go out.

______________________________________

Once Shido is able to walk on his own, he gets right to work. He walks the full length of the island several times. (The boy follows him in the ocean, swimming from a safe distance away. Watching. As always.) He surveys his environment and makes a few decisions. 

His first order of business is to make a proper shelter. The outcropping of rocks the boy showed him served well enough in a pinch, but there is not enough room for Shido to stand up. He needs a better home, preferably away from the ocean as much as possible. To stay dry. Shido is getting rather tired of being permanently wet.

So he builds himself a hut out of beech reeds, wood, and palms fronds. Sharpening stones into makeshift axes is damn hard work! Luckily, the boy is there to provide him with a steady source of freshwater and food (whale meat, he explains, and Shido doesn’t really want to know where it comes from). It takes him a few days to make his hut, but once it’s finished, Shido is quite proud of himself. 

“See this?” Shido says to the boy, standing with his hands on hips, gesturing arrogantly to the (admittedly unimpressive, to a normal person) hut he’s managed to put together. “This is the type of home humans live in. Tall and sturdy. Protection from the wind and rain. A man’s home. Do you see?”

The mermaid boy smacks his tail against the water happily. His version of clapping. Noisy applause. “Yes! It’s wonderful!” 

Shido rubs his mustache with the back of his hand. Filled with a rush of ego at the boy’s praise. It’s nice to have a cheer squad for everything he does. His wounded self-image can use some fluffing. Bandaging and polishing. Shido appreciates it.

He regards the boy with a look of tender fondness. He lets himself indulge in the wonderment in this boy’s eyes. This boy has such a cute, honest face. If Shido stares at him too long, or sometimes not long at all...his manhood eases into a half salute. 

The sea captain is hungry. Nearly starving. Two months without intercourse is quite a long time for him. Shido does not entertain the notions of relationships and emotional attachments, but he keeps himself well-fed sexually. He has needs, perhaps more prominent needs than other men. But he doesn’t bother questioning why or doubting himself. He’s a man who takes what he needs and enjoys it. For Shido, it’s usually a different woman every week (barmaids, secretaries, and women with a penchant for men in uniform, which is Shido’s favorite dish). During long stretches at sea, he avails himself of the young men aboard his ship. In his experience, there’s an endless reserve of supple young recruits willing to go ass up for their captain on a lonely night far away from home. Useful enough in their purpose and easily discardable after the fact. 

Right now, Shido would give anything for even the most fumbling, blubbering new recruit. His body is getting stronger again and his full appetite has returned. 

All he has, though, is this mermaid. This boy with the round, silver-studded face and the eyes that watch him constantly. Ardent and reverent in their fascination. 

The boy would be a meal on his own, no question there, if only he were human. As he is...he’s a fish. Shido stares at the long, curvaceous tail sinking in and out of the water and wonders….how? Would he even be able to…? 

“Can I see inside?” The boy cranes his neck, trying to see all of this modest shack Shido fashioned. 

Shido smirks. “Of course, my dear boy,” he rumbles, throwing open the door to show him everything. (A sandy floor and a mattress of woven grass. Nothing exciting in the slightest.) 

On heaven’s honor, Shido would carry this boy into his grass bed and make love to him right then and there if he could---

But he can’t. For one, the boy won’t even allow Shido to touch him! For two, where would Shido drop his anchor? Where does his ship dock, in the tail of a beast such as this? There might actually be a place, but Shido is not quite eager to think of it. A stinking fish hole. Has he really fallen so far that he’s imagining…? 

Roiling waves of frustration and disappointment slap Shido upside the head. He growls low in his throat and picks up a spear. He needs to hunt. He needs to go stab something and make a real dinner for himself. 

Alone. For once. Just a fleeting moment away from the scrutinizing eyes of this omnipresent, tantalizing creature.

Sadly, there is nowhere he can go that the mermaid cannot see him. The island is not big enough for even a modicum of privacy. Even inside the hut, the door does not close all the way. Shido did the best he could, but it’s not a hotel room. It’s some reeds he shucked together and planted in the sand. 

He takes a deep breath and tries to cool the raging heat in his loins. This is not one of his strong suits, controlling his own lust, but he knows that cooler heads will prevail here. So he tries.

It’s a half-hearted attempt, honestly. But still. He tries. 

______________________________

That night, Shido manages to catch a good haul. He’s sick of fish, so he teaches himself how to spear the seagulls that perpetually plague him. It feels good to watch those sky rats perish at his hand. He kills a few more than necessary, just to relish the satisfaction. 

Which means that he has some leftover for the boy. While Shido roasts his seagulls over a fire, he offers a seagull carcass to the boy. “Here,” he suggests. “Try this.” 

The boy sniffs the carcass questioningly. “You eat that? Safe? Is it safe?” 

Actually, sailors warn against eating seagulls. They say it brings bad luck, or sea madness. Shido would normally agree, except that under the current circumstances he’ll go stark raving mad if he eats fish for one more night. So he’ll take his chances eating the gulls. 

“Yes, certainly,” he tells the boy. “I just killed it. So it’s fresh.” He dangles the gull by one foot. A drop of blood falls from the breast wound where Shido’s spear hit true. 

When the blood reaches the sand, something terrifying happens. 

The boy’s eyes turn black like a shark’s. He snarls and snatches the bird out of Shido’s hand with his teeth. Crunching bones and flesh and feathers, hissing and growling like a wolf defending its dinner from the pack. The boy buries his face in the bird meat, blood and entrails flying in all the directions. He chomps and chomps. Thick red juices stream down his arms as he eats. 

Shido scurries backwards from the boy, cradling his own hand. Jesus, did that kid manage to get a finger off? Thankfully, no. But it was a close call! Shido can still feel the warm, sharp snap of those jaws a hair’s breadth away from his soft human skin. He won’t soon forget it! 

He watches the boy eat. Willing away his automatic terror. This boy...when he eats like that, there is nothing human about him. He’s a carnivorous monster. No different than a nameless dog that hunts in the night. 

The crimson fins on the boy’s tail seem a bit redder to Shido in that moment. 

But when he’s done… 

He looks at Shido with the brightest smile. Red smudges staining his mouth. “Mmm! Good! That was good!” His eyes are still black. “Do you have any more?” 

Shido tosses him the rest of his seagull haul. Suddenly not hungry. The boy devours everything without leaving so much as a feather behind. 

There is a difficult, shattering second when Shido wonders what will happen when he runs out of gulls…. The last thing he wants is for those deadly teeth to turn against him in a fit of blind gluttony---

“Ah. Thank you!” The boy stretches his arms up high. Licking the blood off his arms. Seemingly content. “Fresh and tasty! I’ve never had that before, but I liked it.” He catches Shido’s eye and giggles. “You were right. Like always.” 

Just like that, they’re back to normal. Shido breathes a sigh of relief. Now those brownish cherry wood eyes have returned to their usual shade. The danger has passed. The boy is full.

The danger...Shido runs a hand through his beard as he takes note of the fact that his boy is truly dangerous. It’s easy to forget, with how earnest and innocent he is most of the time. But there’s a predator in the heart of this mermaid. And Shido…

He clicks his teeth in disgust. At himself this time. He’s hard again. His cockhead pulses irritably against his scratchy uniform pants. 

Sweet lord deliver him! Why on earth did he find that arousing? Such a brutal display of hunger.

Maybe that’s why. Shido likes to see his boy hungry. He likes to see his want. He likes to see him partaking in a bounty and eating his fill. It helps him imagine…

Hmm. Would the boy be that ravenous if Shido fucked him? Would he hiss and growl, animalistic in his desire the way that Shido has always secretly fantasized seeing in a lover? Does he want so perfectly and completely when faced with a man’s burgeoning cock?

Damn it all to hell. Shido is too riled up. He can’t will this erection away. Not this time. He needs to take care of it.

He sits with his legs crossed. Tugging his beard hairs tersely as he waits for the boy to retreat back to his cave for the night. 

____________________________________

The taste of bird blood and gamey meat remains on the Sharkblood boy’s tongue for a while. Such an interesting new taste! But he’s still a little hungry. 

For no reason in particular, he finds himself picking through the remnants of the man’s shipwreck, which has long since made a home on the ocean floor. He wonders if there are any cans of fish left. It’s a treat he never got a chance to eat. 

So many interesting things in this shipwreck! Bits and pieces of a world the boy does not know. Wooden and metal things that look like they belonged somewhere once. The boy glances at all of them while he searches. 

He finds no cans, but he does find a garden of clams! Clams are delicious, too. He pries them open with his sharp claws and feasts merrily.

In one clam, he finds a pearl. Usually the boy discards pearls right away; they have no taste or nutritional value to him. But he thinks maybe the man might appreciate a pearl. He likes shiny things, doesn’t he? He might want to stick it to his clothing (which has devolved over the span of his time on the island. Now he wears nothing but his white buttoned down undershirt with the sleeves hacked off, and some black uniform pants that have also been cut at the knees). Will it make him feel important to have something shiny on his body again?

The boy wants the man to feel important. 

He clutches the pearl in his hand and swims right back to the island. Interestingly enough, the man is not on the shore. The boy peers inside his hut and he’s not there either. 

Hmm? Where could he be…?

The boy ducks down into the water and resurfaces in the middle of the island. The lake. From here, he has the best vantage point. 

But it turns out he doesn’t have to look very far at all. The man is next to the lake’s edge. One of his favorite places, actually; it’s the least sandy area on the island, surrounded by large aquatic plant leaves and slick rocks. 

The man is...busy.

He’s on his hands and knees, his pants hanging around his thighs. His bare body is on display under the pale moonlight. The boy has never seen these parts on a human...there is a curved and creased place in the back (which he has quite a good view of, and it seems quite enticing. Muscles flexing as the man works). And in the front…

The boy sinks into the water until only his eyes stick out. He knows that perhaps he should not be watching this. It feels private. Sexual. The boy sees the man’s long hardness, firmly gripped in one hand. Slipping between clenched fingers. Big, thick, red, and wet. The boy knows what that part is---but he is confused.

There is no partner? Is this sex, if there is no partner? The man is making love to his hand. What is this…? Merfolk do not give themselves pleasure with their own hands. It would be unthinkable. Since, from what the boy understands, sexual pleasure can only be achieved with the chosen partner. 

Yet, the man seems pleased by his own actions. Rutting his hips forward, shoving his penis into his own fist. Rubbing himself quickly, face screwed up in some kind of sheer, unconscious grimace. The boy has never seen the man’s face so red, nor so intense. As if he’s answering a primal urge. A code written in the intimate parts of the man.

The boy watches. Eyes glued to the sight. He wants to see everything. Every part of the man, especially the parts he normally hides underneath clothing. The boy wants to see  _ more _ …

His face heats up. Burning hot, like a warm patch of earth near a hot spring bed. The boy’s chest  _ aches _ . He gasps and lays a hand on his chest where the pain is, checking to see if he has been struck. He hasn’t. His outsides are fine. But his insides...the yearning.

The yearning is back. Stronger now. A petal of a feeling, unfurling into a full bloom. The center of which is molten hot. Bright as the sun. Hot enough to make the boy’s breath become thin. His whole body quivers with some type of nameless need. He wants---he wants---

“Take it, take it...good boy…that’s it, take it...” 

The man is repeating a mantra under his breath. His hand and his hips speed up. Pulling himself towards an end of some kind---!

Slapping a hand to his mouth, the boy whimpers with a need so powerful he feels his body might crack. His bones, are they so brittle? There is a light inside of him, burning like fire, that wants to rend him apart! The water around his body is slick and cold and it makes the boy’s nipples harden uncomfortably. He feels…

He wants to open. Is he? Is he going to….?

The hard, angry looking penis in that man’s hand. The boy wants to feel it. He wants to smell it and taste it. He wants to  _ know _ it. If the boy opens for the man, will the man take him? Will he let the boy have him? Will it feel...oh, how will it feel? This choking, relentless scream of joy and yearning. Will it be satisfied when his body holds that penis deep inside? Will it feel even better than it does right now?

The boy’s throat expands. A song bursts in his mind---a song! A siren call that his people can only hear or sing when their body has chosen! The boy can hear it now. His lips tremble with the need to sing it. To draw the man closer. He wants the man to hear it and know the boy’s desire. To feel it himself so that they can share it. They can share the want together and it will be beautiful! 

“Hnnh---” With a broken off grunt, the man releases into his hand. 

The boy blinks in confusion. White liquid came out of him. Is that the fertilizing material? When that goes inside the boy, will it fertilize his eggs? 

A beat of tremulous, stabbing desire thrashes the boy’s stomach. Lower, into the bed of his scales. The top recesses of his tail, where his flesh meets his scales in a haphazard pattern. A secret place. A place that has never opened for the boy, but that suddenly feels like it might burst! 

Sighing, catching his breath, the man leans back into a sitting position. Wiping his hands on the rocks. He’s about to turn around. He might see---

Bashful and afraid, the boy disappears under the water’s surface with a soft plop. It might sound like a frog jumping into the lake, or a bird alighting. But the boy dives down, down, all the way down. Back to his cave.

His heart is racing and his face is still hot. He looks at his body. He has not opened. But the skin there is tender. When the boy touches it, he trembles.

This is...this is what he thought. It’s real. Almost certainly now. His body is making a choice.

A tiny, shy smile reaches his lips. He holds the pearl tightly in his hand, having nearly forgotten about it. Now, he thinks he’ll keep it for himself. A reminder of tonight. What he saw and what he felt. 

Even though he is somewhat scared of the changes happening to his body, the unlooked for feeling of  _ life  _ and  _ awareness  _ and  _ lust  _ pressing against his insides, the boy is happy. He imagines the man’s large, strong manhood. Evidence of his arousal. The man is hungry, too. 

That makes the boy very, very happy. He kisses the pearl lovingly and holds it close to his heart. 

____________________________________ 

Courtship, for merfolk, is ingrained through nature. 

Not only that, the boy has seen many shared memories of merpeople courting each other. He has also heard the songs himself in person during mating season. He’s seen the bonding happen in real time. 

Every merperson has their own unique song specifically meant for their one chosen partner. Others may hear the song, but it will sound like nothing but abstract vocal sounds strung together on a loop. However, if the chosen partner hears it and the feelings are returned, the experience is rather different. The partner will hear the song as an expression of intoxicating, irresistible longing. A mirror held up to the soul, beautiful and intimate. They will be drawn to their partner, sing their corresponding music, and gently touch each other’s faces to indicate that the feeling is mutual. The touching may last for a while or it might be over in a moment; this depends on the couple. Immediately afterwards, the pair will mate for life. 

It’s a singular moment for both partners. Held to a magical standard in the clan’s mind. 

The boy does not know how it is for humans. Do they mate for life as well? With their family dynamic, it would make sense! A mother and father should be a mated pair in order to raise their child with such care. Of course, the boy does not know the first thing about raising a baby, but he believes love must be an important part. 

So then, when humans choose a mate, do they sing? How do they show their love in return? 

He does not know. 

The Sharkblood boy is nervous. Very nervous. He stays away from the surface for a whole day, contemplating his choices. His throat burns with the desire to sing---instinctually, he knows he must sing sooner or later. He cannot hide his song once he holds it in his mind. It is not yet mating season, so he feels somewhat alone in the process (though merfolk may choose a mate out of season, it does happen). Besides, the elders would not approve of him mating with a human. They would wag their heads and tell him that he’s on his own for this pair bonding. 

Still. None of that matters. Once the body has chosen, there is no turning back. The process cannot be stopped once started. By anyone or anything. There is nothing the boy can do now except try. He must sing. He must present himself to the man and hope. And hope and hope and hope and hope...that the man accepts him. 

How will he know? He wonders, as the moon shines high in the night sky awash with stars. How will the boy know if the man returns his feelings?

He peeks his head out of the water and finds the man sitting near his fire, roasting food for the evening. It appears he does not see the boy. Good. 

The boy disappears back into the water and reappears in the lake. There is a large rock on the edge of the pool (very near to where the man brought himself to completion the night before). He drags himself fully out of the water and sits atop the rock. Only the very tip of his caudal fin remains submerged, flapping nervously as he takes a moment to get comfortable.

This will be the first time he shows the man his whole body from tail to tip. He wonders if the man will be pleased…. His silver scales shimmer in the moonlight. Dazzling like gems. Like the shiny medals the man fixed to his chest. Maybe that will be good enough.

The boy wants to be good enough. He wants to be more than enough---he wants to be perfect! He wants to be something that the man desires. That the man would choose of his own free will.

These thoughts bring to life the song in his throat. He opens his mouth and begins to sing.

The water in the lake stills. The boy’s music has an ethereal, echoing quality. It sounds like words spoken through the hollow part of a shell. Deceptively distant, boomingly close. He gazes at the moon as his nascent feelings swell inside of him. He thinks of the way he felt last night, watching the man stroke himself so roughly. So alone. So desperate. The boy feels desperate now as well. Mirrored in what he saw last night. He feels that same way. 

His music is desperate, too. If the man can understand it. 

Rustling among the trees calls the boy’s attention. The man has arrived. He looks mystified and vaguely confused. Cautious. He takes his time as he approaches the water’s edge. 

The boy keeps singing. His song goes on and on…. 

Their eyes are locked. The boy is sure his own eyes must be as bright and round as the moon. His scales sparkle under the starlight. Luminescent in their own way. They capture the night’s essence and use it to make his body brilliant. 

The man’s lips part. He’s staring slack jawed. But he still seems defensive. Guarded. His eyes dart around anxiously as if waiting for some kind of trick. Some snare waiting to capture him.

Why does he think that? A note of despair hits the boy’s song.

Why isn’t the man singing back? 

On and on it goes… Too long. They are in a complete stand still. Nothing happens at all. Eventually, the boy’s music fades on its own. 

He’s trembling. He wonders if the man can see how hard he is shaking under all the shiny scales. 

“You…?” the man begins. Brow furrowed. Waiting for an explanation. 

The boy longs to hold him. To be held. He wants to open his arms and beckon the man closer. He wants the man to take out his penis again, so the boy can appreciate it in the clear light of the moon. He wants to  _ see _ . He doesn’t want the man to wear clothes anymore. It doesn’t seem fair!

His body is quivering like a leaf. His stomach, and lower...the pressure is back. The boy knows what’s coming but he is afraid! The man still has not said anything! 

He offers the man an unsure smile. “Did you...like my song?” 

The man nods curtly. “Yes. Though I didn’t understand the words. Was that your language?” 

“Language…” Tears spring to the boy’s eyes. He doesn’t know what ‘language’ is but he knows that the man said he didn’t understand. 

He didn’t understand. It wasn’t the magical moment the boy was hoping for. The unmistakable clarity he wanted. 

“Is that how you speak with your people? The words you use with them?” the man elaborates. He inches forward. His eyes travel up and down the length of the boy’s tail. 

Tilting his head in utter confusion, the boy stammers, “W-with them? No. With  _ you _ .” 

The man’s eyes narrow. He seems more lost than before. His arms cross defensively and he stares in silence for a long time. The quiet night hums around them. Waves lap against the shore in the distance. 

The boy wants to wrap his arms around himself. He’s so full of desire he’s sure he won’t survive! He needs to know that his feelings are reciprocated! He needs to know...he needs strong arms around him and soft hands on his face. The scales on his cheeks are incredibly sensitive right now! Bristling in the cold night air! Aching for the man’s touch…

“Nngh...you...you like?” he chokes out. “Do you like…?” He doesn’t know what else to say! 

Slowly, the man breaks into a smile. “Again, yes. I liked your song very much.” He frowns. Surprised at himself. “I...thought it was beautiful…” 

Beautiful! The boy’s body vibrates like a stringed instrument, a thing only the man knows how to play. Beautiful---like---? 

The man is leering at him. His smile is still there, but it’s a ghost of its former self. An afterthought. He’s fixated on the boy’s tail. His eyes take their time perusing every inch. 

He raises a hand as if in a trance. The boy’s fins flap helplessly. On some level, he knows what the man is about to do. But he’s so overcome with  _ want _ that he doesn’t know how to stop it! His tail twitches and his body heaves a collective gasp. 

Caught in a compulsion, the man runs his fingers down the boy’s caudal fin. Caressing the length of it, exploring it gently...

Like that, all the pent up yearning inside the boy implodes in a graceless shout. His body writhes in place. Two crashing waves of hunger and sweet pleasure collide in his core. It’s such a simple touch, but it feels better and more intense than anything the boy has ever experienced! Like something powerful yet untamed has been called to the surface of his skin. Dying for attention, to be stroked and touched just like this!

He opens. He’s wide open! A rush of slick gushes out of him and he moans high and desperate. Face pointed towards the dark sky. 

It’s…

...all wrong! 

Humiliated, the boy presses an embarrassed hand to his mouth and dives back into the water. The cold water feels like an assault on his overheated body and he cries. He cries and throws himself into the darkest corner of his cave. Curled up in a ball, wrapping his tail around his body to protect himself. Pressing his face against his own scales. Rubbing his cheeks to chase away the yearning.

_ Tits _ . He learned this word from the man. It’s something he’s not supposed to say, he knows that. Tits and fuck and hell. Tits fuck hell! 

What just happened. 

He looks down at himself and sees his opening. Alone like this, that parted slit is an obscene thing. But still, his slick trickles out and floats thickly in the water’s current like spilled blood. The boy has never seen his own genitals---the flap keeping them hidden only appears when mating with the chosen partner, only for them and no one else---so he takes a moment to marvel at the sight. 

These parts are his. 

_ His _ . 

The man summoned them just by being who he is, and then these parts appeared! These lewd, throbbing parts of him were inside all along, just waiting for the chance to come out. Once they found  _ him! _

Really, these parts belong to the man as much as the boy. They wouldn’t have revealed themselves without him. So, the man has a right to them in his own way. He has a right to see them. To touch them…

Oh...oh but...the boy wants him to  _ touch!  _ Right there, right where his body needs it most...that moist cavern of itchy need.

Beautiful, he said. The man called the boy’s song beautiful. What will he say when he sees these parts? 

And. 

_ And _ .

The boy recalls the look in the man’s eyes. Transfixed. Fascinated. Curious. 

Yes, everything was done out of order! The man did not sing back, he did not acknowledge the boy’s feelings at all. He did not say anything that would reveal his own desires. He did not touch the boy’s face like he should have. Instead he jumped straight to touching him in such an intimate place! The caudal fin, an erogenous zone meant only for a mated pair! The man touched him there before they were even properly bonded! It’s so scandalous and wrong, and yet...it felt very, very good. That gentle stroke made something explode inside the boy. At the time, he thought he might die. 

Now he hungers for more. 

The man did not reject him, the boy reminds himself. He  _ touched _ . Not in the right place or at the right time, but still. They are not the same species. The order of things is not so clear. Maybe the man had been about to claim him when the boy ran away too fast! 

He was frightened. He was disturbed and disheartened that his courtship did not have the desired effect. And he felt more vulnerable than he ever had before in his entire life. Wet and open. So he fled as fast as he could.

Maybe that was his mistake. Maybe the man wanted him and the boy just didn’t realize!

Or maybe...the man is already mated. Maybe he’s missing a wife, a mother of offspring, back in the human world. The place that he left behind. Maybe the man has no interest at all in a Sharkblood mermaid boy. Maybe he just wants to get back home and forget all this!

The boy doesn’t know. He doesn’t know. 

But the facts of his reality remain unchanged. His body has chosen, there can be no doubt now! He’s open and ready to be mated. In a situation like this, there is only one thing he can do.

Keep trying. He must keep trying! He must go on and do his best. He must be smart about it, keep his desires hidden behind his mouth the way the man does. He must wait until the time is right and then bare himself in full.

He must try again. He must.

He  _ must _ .

____________________________________

That mermaid is acting weird. 

First, he stays away from the island for a whole day (unheard of!). Then, he suddenly appears in the lake, well past dinnertime (and Shido has never eaten alone before). Singing. Fucking singing! Like the mermaids of legend. The sirens that sailors warned each other about for centuries.

The boy’s music was...potent. When that strange, echoing voice entered Shido’s ears, he was entranced. He found himself walking without consciously moving his feet. Searching. Compelled forward by some kind of magnet. Only to find the boy, draped over a rock in all his glory. 

Shido was in awe of the sight of him. That tail is about as long as Shido’s whole body. Monstrously long, really. And that caudal fin! It’s as wide as Shido’s wingspan! Both his arms from tip to top. Giant. A trailing, sweeping fan like lacey curtains or a shimmering, blood red skirt. 

It’s beautiful. That’s the truth of it. The tail was beautiful in the white light of the moon and stars. Glittering and spectacular. Combined with the boy’s voice…

Intoxicating. 

Shido felt like he was drunk. His head swam. Suddenly all he wanted was to hold the boy gently in his arms and kiss his face. He might have walked right into the ocean to get to him---

And that’s when he came back to himself. A siren’s call is a trick, isn’t it? A trap. A thing mermaids use to lure men into the ocean so they can feast on their bodies after they drown. That’s what Shido has heard. He thought the rumors were false because he never heard the boy sing until last night. 

But why….

Why would the boy sing  _ now _ ? If he wanted to seduce Shido into drowning himself, he could have done it much easier when Shido was injured and out of his mind! In fact, he could have let Shido die naturally in the shipwreck that nearly killed him (would have killed him, if not for the boy). 

Why does the boy want him dead now, after all this time together?

It doesn’t add up. Shido must distrust a siren’s music on principle, but the boy...he trusts the boy. The boy saved him. Stayed by his side. Obedient and helpful. The boy has been nothing but loyal this entire time. Months! Shido doesn’t believe the boy would try to kill him.

So then, what does the music mean? 

Compounded on top of everything, Shido fell victim to the saccharine spell of that music in the end. The sight of that boy laid bare before him. That tail. Such a powerful, muscular thing. Covered in finery. Sparkling silver and lacey damask. Shido couldn’t help himself. He just had to touch a little…

And, Jesus on the cross. The sound that boy made when Shido touched him. 

Like he just experienced an orgasm for the first time in his life. 

Shit. That gets Shido so hard. He’s terribly aroused by the thought of the boy orgasming under Shido’s hand. Helpless, confused, and hungry. Needy for Shido. Mewling for him. Brought to completion again and again by a light massage to his tantalizing tail. Shido would do it. Fuck yes, he would! He would massage that creature’s tail all day and all night if it got the kid off. Shido would be  _ happy _ to do it. 

He was so turned on after the boy left, he needed to jerk off again. For the second time that day. Shido’s appetite is such an unruly thing! A blessing and a curse, isn’t it. His libido makes him masterful in the bedroom, but it clouds his judgement when he doesn’t get the chance to slate his lust on the regular. So sometimes Shido finds himself impaired. 

This might have been one of those times. The boy skittered away immediately after being touched, as could be expected. He’s made it clear that he does not want Shido to touch him. So now, Shido isn’t sure...will the boy ever come back? Has Shido crossed some type of line that mermaids will not tolerate? 

Is Shido well and truly screwed? At least he’s strong enough now to survive on his own without the boy, but there’s his sanity to consider. Shido will go insane alone on this island with no one to keep him company. His plan to fashion a raft and oar is a foolhardy one at best (will a raft made of beech reeds hold together against the ocean’s waves? Almost certainly not!). There is a good chance Shido will kill himself out there! 

His choices are suddenly remarkably slim. Risk death on the ocean, or stay on the island and lose his mind. 

Heaving a long, forlorn sigh, he folds into a sitting position on the shore and rests his head in his hands. 

Think. He needs to think. He needs to come up with a plan to wrestle his way out of this situation. Somehow…

A familiar splash knocks Shido out of his reverie. He looks up---

There he is. The beautiful mermaid boy. Crawling up the beach, laying on his stomach as he peers at Shido with an intensity only he is capable of. 

“Alright?” the boy asks. “Are you hurt?” 

Shido is so deliriously happy to see him! If he were a lesser man, he would pull him in for a kiss without any more damned dawdling...but, fortunately, he restrains himself. 

Swallowing hard, beating back a pulse of heady relief (thank god the boy came back!), Shido smiles at him and shakes his head. “No, I’m not hurt. I’m quite alright.” 

Flecks of guilt dirty Shido’s relief. He inspects the boy from a careful distance and adds, looking away, “Are you...alright? Last night, were you…” 

At the mention of ‘last night,’ the boy flinches. Shrinking back from Shido automatically. It makes Shido feel like such an asshole (which is something he thought himself rather immune to feeling). 

Only one thing left to do: Man up.

Gathering his pride, Shido faces the mermaid and says in a steady voice, “I apologize for what happened last night. I shouldn’t have done that, and if you were hurt….” He glances at the boy’s tail, checking for signs of injury. Maybe that was a cry of pain, not pleasure. Shido shudders to think! “...is there any way I can help you? To...make up for it?” 

Shido wishes he could say his cheeks were their normal color. Not bright red and flaming. Shido wishes that he was the man he usually is, standing at the helm of a ship, far beyond the reaches of human embarrassment. 

But he’s not. Here he is. Blushing. Asking the mermaid boy for forgiveness. 

Well. Good thing they’re alone out here. No one else has to witness this side of Shido and deign to live to tell the tale. 

The boy’s eyes are watery and so, so wide. He’s reading everything he can off Shido’s face. In a moment, he breaks out into the most honest, adorable smile. “No, no,” he says. Wagging his fins in the shallow water. “Not hurt. I am fine.” 

He leans closer to Shido. The smell of seawater and sunshine follows him. “Thank you,” he whispers. 

So delicate and sweet. God, Shido wants him so badly. His control is threadbare.

Clearing his throat, he forces himself to turn away. He wants to scoot backwards and create some distance, but he’s just not that strong. Instead, he sits there like a stone statue and replies, “I haven’t done anything for you to thank me. But, if you’re alright then...that’s good.” 

The boy slaps his tail on the water’s surface. His gleeful little applause. He rolls back towards the sea and produces a clam from somewhere. “Hungry?” he asks, prying the clam open with his strong webbed hands. He shoves a handful of clam meat in his mouth and offers the rest to Shido. 

Shido takes it with thanks, but he’s not hungry. His mind is torn in a thousand different directions and his very soul is on the line. He’s no longer at the point where he’s questioning whether it would be moral or decent to fuck this boy. No. Now he’s in a place where he doesn’t know if he can stop himself from fucking him.

Yeah. He’s there. 

As the boy chews, he suddenly starts asking a million questions. “Home? Where is your home? Others? Do you have others who are missing you?” 

Shido sets the half-eaten clam down in the sand. “I am a resident of the Royal City. About two leagues out from where my ship went down. I am in the employment of the governor, who receives his charters from the king. I’m sure they assume my crew and I have all perished by now. I doubt they will be sending anyone to search for us.” 

Assuredly not. Shido knows the governor well. He’ll consider this a chance to recoup his losses and leave the matter be. Perhaps there has already been a cold, rudimentary funeral service for The Ark’s crew. Shido imagines his portrait draped with black ribbons. It almost brings a smile to his lips. 

“And...family?” The boy licks his palm clean of juices. Eyes glued to Shido’s face. “Do you have any family? Children? A mother for your children?” 

Shido laughs at the idea. “No. No family. No wife, no kids. I’m a bachelor. A rather old one, but still.” His eyes crinkle around the edges as he surveys the boy’s reaction. To see if he understands what Shido means.

“Wife? What is ‘wife’?” the boy asks. 

A scornful huff escapes Shido. “What is a wife...hmm. Baggage, I’d say. A weight strapped to your feet. Not very useful when you’re sailing across the ocean.” 

Worried, the boy stares at Shido’s feet. Then back to his face. “So...you don’t have one?” 

“No. No wife, no woman. Well. Some women, but.” He chuckles. “No one important.” 

“So you don’t have a pair?” The boy holds up two fingers and presses them together. “Two?” 

Shido regards the boy thoughtfully. He has no idea what he’s talking about. “Two...what?” 

“Two of  _ you _ . Not one, but  _ two _ .” The boy does the same motion with his hands.

Lost, Shido shakes his head. “I don’t think I understand. But whatever you’re saying, no. I don’t have one of those either. When my parents died years ago, I lost all the family I ever had. So I’m…” He holds up one finger. “One.” 

A curling, satisfied smile twists the boy’s lips. Shido would be a fool not to notice it. For some reason, it gives him an uneasy feeling. 

“Then…” The boy stares out at the ocean. “Will you ever...leave here? Will you go? Back to where you came from?” 

Fixing the boy with an honest yet sympathetic look, Shido nods. “I’d like to. Yes. If I can.”

The mermaid looks down at the sand. His tan hair falls in front of his face, hiding his expression. 

“A man like me can’t stay on an island in the middle of nowhere,” Shido explains. Regretful that the boy has to hear this, since he’s clearly disappointed, but Shido knows there’s no sense in hiding it. He does not plan on staying here for the rest of his life (dear lord, no). “I need to be in my city. With my own kind. I still have dreams. Ambitions. Things I want to do with my life that are important. Do you understand?” 

Still hiding his face, the boy nods. “Yes. I understand. You are important.” 

The fact that this boy so readily agrees gives Shido such a thrill. He licks his chapped lips and feasts himself on the sight of the boy’s pale, scaly skin. 

“But how will you leave?” Raising his head, the boy blinks rapidly. Thoughts racing behind his eyes. “Boat? Will you make a boat?” 

Shido nods with a defeated sigh. “Yes. Some type of boat. I’ll have to use whatever I can find on the island, so I can’t say the rig will be seaworthy, but…”

“Rig? Sea...worthy?” That cute nose scrunches in confusion.

“I just mean I don’t know what kind of ship I’ll be able to make here. Don’t get your hopes up, alright?” Shido sneers in ironic deprecation. “Whatever I make, it’ll be nothing like the ship I used to have.” 

At that, the boy nods. “Yes. The big one. You steered. Right?” 

“That’s right.” 

A thread of curiosity winds through the boy’s expression. “How? How did you tell it to move? Something big like that…what do you need?” 

Shido has explained the mechanics of a ship’s sails and rudders before. Haphazardly, to an extent. But the boy clearly understands that a ship has parts that help it move. And when he asks that last question, ‘what do you need,’ it makes Shido feel like the boy wants to help him. 

He could really use the help. 

“There are many things a good ship needs to set sail,” Shido explains. He picks up a stick and begins drawing in the sand. “But to steer properly, I’d need my helm.” He draws the ship’s steering wheel. That big wooden circle made of the spokes and pegs. The thing so near and dear to Shido’s heart. 

The boy’s eyes focus with a kind of sharpness. “This?” he asks, pointing to the drawing. “This is what you need?” 

“In part, yes. A boat with good steering mechanics is much better prepared for a long journey such as the one I will need to take.”

“I know this.” Brimming with excitement, the boy points to the drawing again and again. “I’ve seen it! Your steer part is found!” 

Shido hesitates, trying to make sense of that. It would be impossible to find this steering wheel again; it was lost to the sea when The Ark went down! 

Unless…

Could it be? 

Before Shido can say anything, the boy dashes back into the water. “Wait! I’ll bring it!” And just like that, Shido is alone again. 

Stranded on the beach. Stunned. 

Not five minutes later, the boy returns. As promised! In his hands, he carries a round, chipped circle covered in seaweed---the wooden lacquer is unmistakable. Shido would recognize it even in death! 

That’s his steering wheel! 

He reaches for it, and the boy delivers it straight to his hands. “This is…” Shido marvels at the sight of his lost helm. It is missing a few pegs, the lacquer is cracked and a few chips have been taken out of the woodwork. Shido tosses away the seaweed and detritus, fondling the engraving on the bottom of the wheel. ‘The Ark - Est. 1801’ it reads. In fact, Shido was there for this ship’s unveiling in 1801. He remembers that day, as well as the day they officially placed it under his command.

A rush of nostalgia and deep longing overtakes him. He knocks his head against the wood, clutching it as tight as he can. Vowing never to let go again. 

“I can’t believe you found this…” he says, after a while spent schooling his emotions. 

The boy is staring at him relentlessly. Of course. The brightness inside of him knows no bounds. He stares at Shido with such a hopeful look---not expecting praise, it seems, but hoping Shido will be happy. 

“Is it...good?” he asks. Dorsal fin peaking out of the ocean. “Is this what you need?” 

Such a good boy. So loyal and genuine. If Shido had more people like this boy on his crew, maybe the ship wouldn’t have gone down in the first place.

Why can’t everyone in the world be as smart and helpful as this creature? 

Consumed by respect and affection for the mermaid, Shido nods proudly. “Yes. This is mine. I am so glad you found it. Thank you...” He wishes the boy had a name so he could invoke it rightfully. 

But in a way, the boy needs no name. He is the only one of his kind. Not just a mermaid, no. This kid is another breed entirely. An obedient, supportive, benevolent type of person Shido can find no fault with. None whatsoever. 

He lays the helm on the ground---far out of the waves’ reach---and beckons the boy closer. “Will you come closer to me? If you’re comfortable...” 

Whatever the hell Shido’s about to do, he knows he has no regrets. This miraculous creature is a gift from the sea. A precious offering to make up for his lost ship. Of course, nothing could replace The Ark, but this boy...this boy is undoubtedly a treasure. 

Every inch of him is beautiful. Shido wants to hold him---he  _ will _ hold him. He’ll have him. He must! No other choice! If Shido doesn’t fuck this boy right now, he’s going to go utterly mad.

Interestingly enough, the boy accepts. He approaches him, sneaking further up the shore. “I found more things from your ship,” he claims. “I can bring them, too. Do you want?” 

Shido grins. His cock is so hard for this fishboy, he can barely think. But it feels so natural! Shido has had a hard-on that won’t quit, whenever he looks at this mermaid in a certain light. He needs to slake himself inside of this creature now. 

No more fucking around. 

“Yes, I would,” he answers. Sitting in front of the boy so they are eye to eye. Close enough to feel each other’s breath. “I would like that very much. And, I am going to touch you now. My little treasure, would that be alright?” 

A tint of redness rises to the boy’s scaly cheeks. His mouth gapes and--- _ bless _ \---he nods. Giving his consent. 

Shido parts the creature’s hair away from his face. He tucks it behind his red, fin-like ear. Smiling softly (but so, so hungrily), he runs his palm down the boy’s face. Cupping it in his coarse hand. 

“You lovely, sweet thing,” Shido coos, rubbing his thumb across the pattern of scales on his cheek. “Why won’t you let me touch you more?” 

A whole-body shiver works its way through the mermaid boy. He holds Shido’s hand against his face and nuzzles it. “I want you to...I want you to...touch…” 

Shido chuckles. 

He knew it. He knew it! That cry last night was no yelp of pain! It was a young man’s first climax! No two ways about that! Shido made this ancient, two-hundred-year-old creature cum for the very first time last night.

That realization goes straight to his head. And cock. Pulsating with lust, Shido leans in close. “Then that’s exactly what I’ll do,” he promises. 

With that, he brings their lips together for something like a kiss. It’s not quite a real kiss. Shido is concerned about kissing too much (he doesn’t put his tongue anywhere that mouth, not with the set of fangs inside), so he just pecks him on the lips. Confident, but restrained. Letting the boy get used to the sensation.

“Mmmm…” 

He hears a soft, pleased hum. Shido takes a moment to watch the mermaid boy’s reaction. His eyes are closed and he’s trembling. Lips moving, trying to get more of Shido’s touch. He looks fragile and eager. Nothing like the predator he ought to be. No, no. Here, there is only the angelic creature that saved Shido from certain doom and nursed him back to health. Never abandoning him for even one second. 

Shido’s control snaps. The last holdout of his resistance breaks soundly against the incomparable loveliness of this boy. Innocent, shy, but excited. Bedazzled like a jewel from the heavens. 

He pushes the boy down onto the sand. Closely following. Now that his rationality is gone, Shido’s body moves on instinct. He kisses every inch of the boy’s face (those scales are snake-like but surprisingly smooth against Shido’s lips), laying down on top of him. He straddles the boy’s tail and pins him to the ground. Holding his webbed hands on either side of his head. He works his mouth over the supple skin that’s been tantalizing him for months. He presses his lips to the boy’s eyes, his cheeks, his chin, his neck. Trailing the ethereal silver spots. So many little scales! Shido marvels at the placement of them (artistic, strangely precise in their own way) and kisses each one.

“Ah! Ah! Oh…!” The boy writhes underneath him. Extremely sensitive to every touch Shido gives him. 

Burying his nose in the boy’s damp hair, Shido kisses a plush spot underneath the ruffled ear. This mermaid smells like salt and fish. And vaguely, like something floral and creamy. A lady’s sweet pea hand cream, perhaps. How on earth, Shido has no idea. But it’s exquisite! He kisses that spot over and over, chasing the smell with animalistic lust. 

“Nnnnnnh...your beard is so...rough…” the boy gasps. 

Shido smirks. He whispers in his ear, “Yeah. Do you like it?” 

“Mm-mm!” The boy nods furiously. So, so cute! 

Elated, Shido slides a hand down the boy’s torso. He comes to the seam where his flesh fades to scales, then stops. He’ll explore more, for sure, but first he needs to get his bearings. 

“Should I keep going?” he asks.

The boy opens his eyes. Looking right at him with a panting, sweet smile. “ _ Yes _ .” 

Not needing to be told twice, Shido lunges at him again. Kissing a worshipful line from one shoulder to the other. Bold enough to lick the scales and skin wherever he pleases. The boy tastes like the sea. Ocean brine and sunshine baked into warm flesh. It’s fucking delicious! Shido goes crazy over the taste and leaves errant bite marks all over his white skin. Every part of this boy is supple and yielding. His arms, his hands, his stomach, his chest, the set of gills near his ribs. His body quivers with pleasure in Shido’s mouth. 

“I...I sang for you…ah-ha! Oh!” The boy’s hands clutch Shido’s head (not quite so bald anymore, given the months without a razor) when Shido licks those perky nipples he’s been dying to sample. 

The sweet pea smell is quite strong around those brown, delectable nubs. Shido sucks with abandon. Availing himself of their splendor.

“Yes,” he replies eventually. Tonguing the boy’s nipples as he screeches and scrabbles for more, writhing helplessly. “I heard your song. It was lovely.” 

“Oh, oh, aaaah….ahh mmm!” Whenever Shido flicks those nipples with his tongue, the creature can barely speak. All his lessons gone to waste! So, of course, Shido does it even more. 

“I sang for you!” the boy struggles to repeat. “My song was for you!” 

Shido raises his head. “For me?”

“Yes!” The boy’s breath comes in heaving gasps. His chest rises and falls erratically. “I wanted you to hear my song so that we could...become two together. Instead of two ones alone.” He strokes Shido’s face and Shido can’t help growling in satisfaction. How he’s missed this touch! 

But he honestly has no idea what the boy is talking about. Whatever. As long as he keeps crying so nicely and caressing Shido’s face, it’ll be fine. Certainly. 

“My body…” the boy continues, taking Shido’s hand and putting it back on his front. Where Shido left off. “My body chose you.” 

Shido stares at his hand. He’s already fondling the large scales on the boy’s tail, without thinking. Right in the center, there is an open slit. It’s---Shido is sure he’s never seen that before! When did that appear? Is he going insane after all? 

Curious, he slides his thumb across the opening. It is leaking some kind of thick fluid. Fuller than water, but just as slippery…

The boy throws his head back and howls when Shido touches him there. More liquid comes out. Ah. So this is  _ that _ . The placement is familiar enough. About where a vagina would be if the boy had legs and a wet center in between. But the slit is slanted at an odd angle that could never be found on a human’s body. It’s a diagonal line cut like a knife wound. The scales lift to give way to something warm and suspiciously inviting.

Carefully, Shido sticks his fingers inside. 

The boy screams again. His tail goes rigid and then starts flapping uncontrollably. Is he cumming? Difficult to say, but Shido knows for sure the creature is in ecstasy. There is a delightfully distant look in his eyes and a line of drool slipping out the side of his mouth. He meets Shido’s gaze with such a needy, hungry plea on his face…

How could Shido ever deny him?

He peels back the flap and makes a puzzling discovery. The flesh in this place is bluish purple, slimy and permanently slick. There is indeed a hole, winking at Shido in the afternoon light. The indigo flesh puckers around the entrance, like a second set of pursed lips. Or the navel of an orange. Above the opening is another organ. A cylindrical tube that is thick in the middle with loose, floppy skin around the tip. The skin here is translucent and Shido can see the veins running through the inner circulatory system, as well as the shadow of the boy’s body on the other side. 

It is only because of its placement in this private area that Shido thinks to recognize it as a penis. If he saw this out of context he would not be able to make heads or tails of it. Truly, this mermaid’s penis looks more like a flat top mushroom than anything a man might use to satisfy himself...

But when Shido lifts the organ with his fingertips, just out of curiosity, the boy groans so beautifully. His tail jolts, trying to push his organ into Shido’s hands. Begging for more. 

“There, yes! Good! Please, there...feels good…!” The boy arches his back when Shido curls his thumb and forefinger around the base of that member. It is not very hard, long, or wide. About the size of a taper candle. Its most notable quality seems to be its malleability. Shido turns the organ side to side (he has a right to his inquisitiveness; who knows when he’ll ever get the chance to see a mermaid’s penis again) and is surprised to find it can bend almost to a complete right angle. 

Shido strokes the boy’s member delicately. Drinking in all the reactions he’s getting. The boy doesn’t seem to be able to withstand the sensations! He’s gasping as hard as he can, rolling his body this way and that. His eyes are popping out of his head. It seems like he was not expecting to feel anything like this! 

So then...what was he expecting? 

Gentling his strokes, letting the boy breathe, Shido asks, “What’s wrong? Haven’t you felt this before? You must have touched these on your own sometime…” A young man is still a young man, regardless of the species! Right? 

But the boy shakes his head, going cross-eyed as Shido thumbs the loose head of his cock. “N-nuh-nuh...no...never before had…” 

“Is that really true?” Shido squeezes the boy’s manhood with relish. 

“True! True true...oooh!!” The boy nods, and searches Shido’s face with hurt honesty. “Never!” 

Shido narrows his eyes. That can’t be true, though. Not that he really cares, the boy is lovely either way. And it is even lovelier to imagine...

Frustrated, the fishboy presses Shido’s hand against his genitals. Forceful and urgent. “These…” He makes sure Shido is looking him in the eye. “These only opened for you.” 

For him? Confounded and horny as hell, Shido turns his attention to the gasping hole buried in this boy’s soft, violet flesh. Good lord, that hole is calling Shido’s name! He wants to ease that entrance open on his fingers and then bury his cock so deep inside he forgets how to come out. 

Maybe it is true that this mermaid’s secret areas have never been touched by anyone. Maybe Shido will be the first to taste that adorable, luscious passage. 

God help him. He wants to believe that he is. 

He quickens his strokes along that phallus and dips his thumb into the wet mouth underneath. More slick spills out from both the trembling erection and the widening hole. Both genitals drench themselves, defenseless against the onslaught of pleasure. Shido’s hand is soaked with wetness. He stops for a moment to taste it. 

Fuck it all, he wants everything. 

It tastes like the juice from an oyster. Briny and succulent, with the hint of an animal essence somewhere in the notes. It whets Shido’s appetite for some reason. He sucks his hand clean and then drops his face to the spread slit. 

The boy shrieks in a register as high as a dolphin’s. Clicking and gnashing his teeth. Shido sucks the base of his member, then abandons it for the throbbing cunt pressed to his lips. 

This little hole needs to be fucked. Kissed. Loved. Tended to. Cared for. Nourished. Everything. He kisses the thick, silken membranes covering the hole and they magically part for him. His mouth is already used to the taste, so Shido sticks his tongue inside. 

“Waaahhh...nnnn!” Sobs echo above Shido’s head. As intense as the music from last night. Mysterious, reverberant sounds. Shido tongues the boy’s pussy from the inside out, giving him an introduction to the friction of an intimate fuck. 

“G-good!” the boy yells. Warbling. “Goooooood! Sooo goood! Sho...sho...guhd..!” 

Even more wetness splashes along Shido’s cheek, bursting from the head of that member. So Shido comes to the conclusion that this boy is just cumming continuously. Maybe all of this is one big orgasm to him. An endless contraction and release. 

Angels on high, deliver him. Shido is so aroused he can hardly see straight. There’s heat in his eyes and in his brain that makes processing rather difficult. His cock is hard enough to hurt, balls distressingly heavy with unspent release.

He can’t wait any longer. 

Unfastening his trousers, he asks the boy, “Are you ready?” 

Like this, the boy appears to be flayed. Carved open like two halves of a cut strawberry. His arms are open as well, waiting for Shido to enter. Every part of him is open. Just like the boy said. 

“Yes. I’m ready for you.” The boy’s voice is clear, although his lips are not moving. How? Shido doesn’t understand… “Take me now.” 

The moment Shido’s cock is free, he plunges it into that wet, purple hole. He imagined the flesh there would be loose, since so much liquid is pouring out. But no. Not loose at all! This boy’s cunt is perfect! The tightest, warmest, silkiest, most welcoming cunt of Shido’s life. The veins in his forehead bulge at the sensation of being surrounded by such a hole, he has to close his eyes to keep himself together. 

The satisfying rush of putting his cock in something. It’s more glorious than he remembers! Because this hole is really, really special. Shido sees that now. This mermaid has a cunt as polished as a pearl and tight as a glove. Shido could fuck it for hours and hours. Give him time. Give him all the time in the world. All he wants is to fuck this glorious, untouched pussy. 

Shido is speechless. He jerks his hips forward, pounding the deepest parts of his passage right away. He tries to keep his rhythm calm and even, not wanting to go too fast at the start. But it is very, very difficult to control himself. He sucks air and blows it out slowly, trying to maintain a dignified pace. 

What he really wants is to plow this boy into the ground. Fuck this cunt as hard as he can, satisfy all his desires. Quick and heavy. 

“You can. You can fuck me as hard as you like. I can take it. I’m strong.” 

Shido opens his eyes. The mermaid boy is smiling at him. Mouth still closed, he somehow says, “I want you to take everything you need.” 

“I will…” Shido answers, punctuating his words with his hips. Slamming into him. 

“Please. Go ahead.” 

Dropping onto his chest with a groan, Shido fucks him deep. He leans his weight on one forearm, and the other...he doesn’t quite know where to put it. Normally, he hooks his hand under his partner’s knee and throws their leg over his shoulder. When he wants to go deep, that is by far the best angle. 

But this boy has no legs. No point of leverage where Shido can spread him wider. So his second hand hovers awkwardly around the boy’s waist. 

As if in answer to his question, the boy takes Shido’s hand and puts it on one of his fins. “Hold me here. Your hands are perfect. I want to feel them.” 

Of course, these sensitive ruffles. Shido squeezes the red drapery in his hand and fucks the boy hard. Making him scream in that dolphin-like tone.

“Yes, that’s it! Fuck me like that! Please, keep going! Don’t stop!” 

Shido glances at the boy. He’s still screaming. Yet, Shido can hear his words over those screams. As articulate as a human being’s, saying things Shido has not taught him to say. Intelligible, as if the words were spoken directly into Shido’s ear. Or in his…

“I love your cock! Oh, your cock is as amazing as I imagined! I wanted it just like this! For so long…” 

Shido snaps his hips harder. Riding the edge. High from the cunt sucking him in further--there’s suction in that place, as if the boy’s hole is sucking him back--and the words in his head. He’s higher than he’s ever been. 

“I knew you wanted it,” Shido gasps. Holding himself back from a climax. “Keep going. Tell me all the dirty things you imagined I would do to you. And your...divine...fucking cunt!” 

Braying and keening, the boy’s body pushes against Shido’s. Matching his thrusts. Returning the energy with the weight of his humongous tail. It forces Shido to go harder, using every last ounce of strength. 

“I wanted you inside!” The boy’s most human voice proclaims. “I wanted to take your cock inside so that you could mate me properly. Now that we’re mated, I won’t ever leave you. Never. Never ever ever ever ever…” 

“You’re goddamn right!” Shido barks. His face is tangled in the boy’s floral, sweet pea hair. “You’re mine. You and your perfect cunt are mine. Don’t ever leave my side…please...” 

Suddenly Shido is begging. He doesn’t know how it started or why. His mind is only halfway present. He’s drunk like a fool on this boy’s slick and his music and his otherworldly body. Shido can’t think! His wits are narrowed down to the paradise of the hole that holds his cock. Nowhere else. Nothing else matters. 

He just knows that if this hole were to be taken away, Shido wouldn’t know how to survive. A tight fear clenches his throat as he imagines not having it. 

So, he does what he always does in the face of fear. 

He dominates.

“You’re not allowed to stray,” Shido demands. Rutting at a pace that would break most people, but which the boy seems to take without any problem at all. “You’re not allowed to swim off somewhere I can’t find you. You go where you need to go when you must, but always...always...come back to me…so I can fuck you just like this. Just like you want…alright?” 

He holds the boy’s chin upright. Locking eyes with him. “Tell me. Tell me you’ll always come back to let me have you. I must...you must...ngh, oh...” Shido’s sanity is hanging on the edge of a cliff, by his little finger! He’s going to fall. He’ll fall straight down unless this boy promises him----

“I promise. My love. My pair. My human. I will always be near you.” 

Drowning in cherry oak eyes and a cunt as wet as the sea, Shido cums. He cums so hard, he thinks he might have released bits of his brain and organs into the boy along with his spend. He cums on a sustained orchestral swell of satisfaction. Pleased and finally,  _ finally _ satiated. The harrowing cry of his libido is, for once, blissfully silent. 

Shidor rolls over and drags the boy on top of him. Holding him in his arms while he lays flat on his back in the dry sand. 

Overall, this is not entirely how he imagined their first time. He thought he would at least have the wherewithal to take the boy to the overgrown leaves near the lake. Where it is comfortable and cool, without so much pesky sand. They could have lain in the shade afterward until the boy needed to slip away, back to the water. And Shido might have partaken in a drink from the fresh water. 

And he never imagined he would make the boy swear odd vows towards the end. That Shido himself would beg for a connection he’s never had before, that he doesn’t even fully understand…

What happened to him? 

“Are you thirsty? Would you like me to get you some water?” 

Shido regards the boy. He can still hear his voice as clear as day. Because he’s still inside of him.

That must be the trick. When their bodies are one, they share a line of communication through the mind. It’s a phenomenon, yes. But it’s not quite the strangest thing Shido has experienced today. 

“You figured it out, yes,” the boy answers wordlessly. Nodding, slapping his tail against the sand in his way. “This is how my people communicate. Our thoughts are shared directly with pictures and complete ideas. We have no need for words. Together, you and I don’t either.”

“Alright…” Shido allows. Not entirely comfortable with how much the boy might be able to see inside his mind. But not able to stop it one way or the other. 

He takes a second to admire the beautiful sight above him. The boy’s face haloed by the light of the fading sun. His sparkling scales are even more prominent. 

“You’re beautiful,” Shido says. He means it. 

“Ah...thank you!” There’s that brilliant smile. “I’m happy. I’m so happy with you….” The mermaid boy rubs his face against Shido’s. His scales are prickly and they tickle a bit, but. 

It’s worth it to see the envy of the sky itself shine so brightly. 

Suddenly Shido is hard again. Ready. He rolls back over, covering them both in sand, and fucks the mermaid boy once more. Slower, with precision. Steering his hips to the furthest points and giving the boy pleasure from an angle that makes him sing like a songbird. 

Even after that round is done, Shido wants more. He’ll need more. 

Luckily, the evening has only just begun. They have all the time in the world.

__________________________

First, the boy’s body chose. Now, finally, he is mated. 

He’s a pair. For life. Forever. 

He is two. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yeah that's right. They can communicate telepathy during sex. I call it...*puts on sunglasses* Sex Telepathy. You're welcome ^__^
> 
> Thanks for following me to hell, guys. I do appreciate it <3


	3. Farther Shores

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ninchi isn't worried about the captain going back to the city. 
> 
> But humans are more complicated than he knows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I had such clear ideas for this story...until I realized that I accidentally left all the plot for this chapter.
> 
> Whoopsie! 
> 
> Enjoy this giant update lol. Everything else will be in the epilogue.

**Chapter Three: Farther Shores**

“Pass me another.” Shido holds out his hand expectantly. 

On cue, a wooden plank appears in his grip. He doesn’t pause to acknowledge its presence before nailing it into place. 

Ninchi has been helping him build a small boat out of the wreckage of The Ark. There were enough planks at the bottom of the sea. Even water-logged, their veneer holds strong. Better than anything Shido could fashion from reeds and palm leaves. He taught himself how to make nails out of bits of stone. By now, he’s fashioned himself a small dinghy equipped with a half-baked rudder system. A functioning helm. 

It’s coming along nicely. For what it is. 

“It looks wonderful, Captain…” the boy says. 

“She’ll do,” Shido answers. Honestly proud of his work. It takes a genuine sailor to be able to make a boat out of nothing---out of bits and pieces lying on the ocean’s floor. Shido would not dub himself anything less. He’s a seaman. Tried and true.

He loves that the boy knows his name. Captain Shido Masayoshi, which the boy shortens to, simply, ‘Captain.’ That suits Shido just fine.

Their bond---a connection that allows them to communicate beyond the point of words---has brought them to new levels of understanding. The mermaid boy understands names now. Shido even gave him one of his own: Ninchi, a version of the word ‘cognition.’ Since the boy appeared as if from the depths of Shido’s own imagination. That’s how perfect he is. 

Shido knows much more about mermaids now, too. He knows that the boy has no family. Just a clan, which is held more sacred than family anyway. He knows that the boy considers Shido a life-mate and that this is a very important thing for his ilk. A bond as deep as the soul. A merperson can only have one partner (just one, in a lifespan of over 800 years!), and for Ninchi, that partner is Shido. 

As far as Shido is concerned, it’s a good hedging of bets. Even though the structural integrity of this rig is sounder than naught, there’s still a good chance Shido will die out there in the ocean. 

Or, no. He won’t die. Ninchi would never let him die. 

(“Never.” 

Shido hears the boy’s promise in his head. Echoing. The lingering remnants of their telepathic communication stay in his mind. Like footprints. Shido can hear the boy’s words clear as day whenever he summons the memory, or even sometimes without trying. Shido doesn’t know what this means. He only knows...the boy promised to never leave him. To never allow him to die by the sea’s capricious hand. To stay by his side.

“Always. Forever, my love.”

So.)

Shido himself might not perish, but his dinghy certainly might. All it would take is one good storm and the raft is finished. Scattered to the depths of the ocean once more. Then Shido will be right back where he started. On this island in the middle of nowhere. Stranded, with no one but Ninchi to keep him alive and somewhat sane. 

Looking at it this way, Shido is comforted by the notion that Ninchi has sworn some kind of life pledge to him. He understands now that having sex solidified this bond---that Shido was indeed the boy’s first time, by the heavens---and that there is no going back. 

Such mysterious fate, Shido often muses, after having sex with his beautiful mermaid boy. Toying with the ruffles of his ear, the salt-encrusted curls of his hair. So bizarre that this boy’s species would be gifted such longevity, only to hold their chastity save for one other person. Once their mate dies, they will know no other sex partner. It seems a waste! A cruel, ironic twist of fate. 

But Shido doesn’t really think about his soul bond with Ninchi. The weight of it looms like a question mark in the back of his mind. As a human---and as a man with a predisposition towards lothario-hood, who holds monogamy as anathema generally speaking, or at least, in his life up until now---Shido can’t really comprehend the severity of a mermaid’s choosing. A biological imperative to mate for life. A connection that trumps time and age and logic. 

Also, Shido doesn’t want to seriously contemplate the things he said when they fucked for the first time. The way he felt. The fear. The tempest tide of need and desire that swept him away until he was begging Ninchi to stay with him, refusing to allow him to leave. Shido doesn’t...he doesn’t know what came over him! He doesn’t know why he still feels that way, sometimes, when they’re having sex. It’s a pulse of hormones straight to his limbic system that makes him punch drunk and dazed. Saying things that no man wearing Shido Masayoshi’s skin has any right to say. 

The smell of this boy (sweet pea, brine, and animal). The taste of his slick. The caress of his warm, virgin pussy (a siren song for Shido’s cock, which is not capable of resisting that tight, wet, feathery silk clutch). This boy’s sex puts some kind of spell on Shido and he can’t think clearly. 

But it doesn’t matter. On this island, none of that matters. Since it’s just the two of them anyway.

Overall, Shido sees the prospect of this supposed soul bond as a good investment. It ties Ninchi to him and makes it so that Shido never has to question his loyalty and willingness to serve.

That’s good. Very, very good. Especially in life or death situations such as the one Shido finds himself in now. 

Besides, the boy is a great lay! His arms are always willing to open for his captain. Shido avails himself of this boy’s embrace and his purple cunt whenever he pleases. Their lovemaking is beyond good. It has become _necessary_. It keeps Shido’s temper at an even keel, sharpens his mind, and allows him to focus on the tasks at hand.

Ninchi’s body is a commodity. Like any other. Shido will leverage it to his advantage for as long as he can. 

It helps, assuredly, that Ninchi is beautiful and adorable. That his smile sets Shido’s heart at ease. That he truly wants to help Shido and does his best to give him whatever he needs. That he never complains or questions. Not in his words, actions, or thoughts. That he is curiously perfect for Shido in every way. 

There’s nothing wrong with that, either. The sea gods have shown Shido their favor by leading this boy to him. A fortuitous roll of the dice.

Gratitude towards a higher power does not come easily to Shido, but he is smart enough to know when he’s getting the sweet end of a deal. Ninchi is a deal as sweet as they come.

Shido grins and pats the side of his rig. She’s almost finished! “What do you think, my boy? What should we name her?” 

“Her?” Ninchi peers curiously at the dinghy. “Your boat is a woman…?” 

Huffing a laugh, Shido shakes his head. “No, not exactly.” He shrugs his shoulders. “Although, in a way, I suppose so. It’s tradition to refer to our ship crafts this way. I don’t really know how it started, but. I’d say this boat is a ‘she’ alright.” 

Ninchi narrows his eyes and looks harder. “How can you tell, though?” 

The boy doesn’t understand. Too literal, as always. Shido waves the matter away. “Regardless, you should come up with a name. Since you helped me build her.” 

At that, Ninchi’s face lights up. “I helped?” He nods happily. “Yes! I did help! You’re right!” He brays that madman’s howl of a laugh. “So the naming is my job. That makes sense! But it’s my first naming, so...I have to do a good job---” 

A thought strikes him. “I know a perfect name.” 

Without elaborating, he dives down into the water. Shido knows by now to wait this out. Sure enough, moments later, Ninchi reappears with something in his hand. He places it gently at Shido’s feet.

It’s a shiny cockle shell. “That. Let’s name her that,” he declares. 

“A shell?” Shido doesn’t really care. “Alright, that’s fine---"

“No no no! Not just ‘shell’!’” Ninchi shakes his head and points to the cockle again. “The light! Look.” 

Shido looks. He doesn’t understand. 

Undeterred, Ninchi holds out his webbed hand. “Here. Give me yours, Captain.”

As usual, Shido pauses before he gives Ninchi his hand. He knows what the boy is about to do...they do this all the time now. At first, it happened only when they were physically connected through sex, but over time…

Shido sighs in defeat. There’s no sense waiting out this boy’s enthusiasm. He lays his palm over Ninchi’s. 

A rush of thoughts fills his mind like the crash of a high wave. Shido sees a shell nestled in sand at the bottom of the sea. A pale beam of moonlight swathes it, making it shine. Ninchi’s mind voice, articulate, explaining, “The way the light bounces off the cockle shell. White and glittery underneath the moon. It’s so pretty...I like looking at it.” 

When Ninchi lets go, the image is gone. Mostly. Vague afterimages stay in Shido’s mind until he shakes his head to clear them. This boy is getting better at doing that. Whatever _that_ is. Their telepathy. Before, all Shido could hear was his voice. Now he sees pictures and sometimes even has the sensation of feelings. Just now he felt a tiny surge of happiness, like the one Ninchi must feel looking at cockle shells on the ocean floor. 

Shido felt...he feels…

It’s like their minds are wearing the same coat. Sharing the same sleeve. Bumping up against each other, fitted to the same shape. Brethren. Having an intimate conversation. It’s an alarming feeling for any human being, certainly. Shido’s head is not used to company! 

Still. It’s undeniable: The boy’s telepathy is getting stronger. 

Or else...it’s not just the boy. Maybe it’s their connection---or Shido is---

“That’s a good name, isn’t it?” 

Jarred from the lingering effects of that increasingly common experience, Shido runs a hand through his beard. “Yes, I see the beauty in what you’re talking about.” He sighs, rubbing his eyes. “But, that’s...ship names are short. They’re about tradition and familiar stories. Not complicated ideas like that.” 

“Complicated?” The boy blinks a few times. “But...you understand?” 

“Yes, because you…” Shido trails off. He clenches his hand into a fist. Chasing away the feeling of the boy’s cold, clammy hand. 

Shido doesn’t like the way Ninchi can see inside his mind. How he can put thoughts in there. How he can...know things that Shido might prefer to keep to himself.

There’s something of the devil in such an ability. Shido is not overly superstitious or religious, but he can’t possibly let his mind be read like an open book. That’s against his personal principles on every level. Shido wishes Ninchi wouldn’t read him so much, that they didn’t rely on this communication….

There must be a trick to it. Shido is learning. He has to school his thoughts. To keep some things hidden in the shadowy depths of his consciousness. A place where Ninchi maybe can’t reach. 

He’ll get the hang of it before long. 

“How about...Princess Kaguya. It’s an old story about a girl who was born on the moon.” Shido shifts into storytelling mode to distract Ninchi from any awkwardness. “Folktales like that are common titles for ships. My ship, The Ark, was named after a boat in the Bible that held all the world’s animals while everything else was drowned in a huge rainstorm.” 

The boy’s curiosity wins out yet again. He crawls closer to the man. “A girl on the moon? A ship with animals inside? Tell me more. I want to know your stories, too!” 

“Very well.” Their work is done for the day, anyway. 

Shido gets into a comfortable sitting position on the beach. He’s not surprised when Ninchi fights his way into Shido’s space, resting his head on his lap. Typical. Hiding his smile, Shido strokes Ninchi’s head and begins the story of Kaguya. 

He’ll tell him about Noah’s Ark next. Shido has plenty of old stories. Retelling them makes him feel closer to humanity, so he’ll tell them until Ninchi is tired of listening. 

And he won’t ever tire. Because at the end of the day, Ninchi is nothing but a good boy. 

__________________________

The Sharkblood boy is worried. 

Well. The fact is, he’s not a Sharkblood boy anymore. He’s not a child, not a boy, not a virgin. He’s chosen his life partner! He’s mated. He’s an adult.

He’s also not _just_ a Sharkblood anymore. He has a name. He’s Ninchi! He’s a person. Not a human, but. Not just a nameless part of the clan either. 

As expected, the clan disapproves of his mating with a human. They swim further away from him now. He’s allowed to follow, to hunt a few paces behind, but he is not allowed near the nests. Mating season is coming up soon and his clan is focused on the task of laying seaweed and shells to make their shared egg nest. Ninchi thought…

He thought that his own eggs would go in that nest. 

But he’s not allowed. The elders bared their fangs at him when he approached the nest with an armful of seagrass (leaves he had chosen because of their softness, thinking them perfect for his future babies). They refused his offerings. They made it clear he and whatever offspring he might be carrying are barred from the clan’s nest. The Sharkbloods don’t trust him. They can’t. Not since he’s mated to an outsider. And a human, no less.

So Ninchi is alone. He has learned that feeling now. Loneliness. A severance. A sensation of drifting. Carried by the current of the sea somewhere the eyes can’t see and the ears can’t hear. Singlehood. 

It’s distressing. Only because…

He thought his eggs would be safe in the clan’s nest. Instead, Ninchi builds a makeshift nest in his own solitary cave. It’s much smaller, very modest. But Ninchi puts love into it all the same. He adorns it with shiny cockle shells and clams. It will do. The main problem is that there is no one to guard the nest when he is away. How will the eggs stay safe? 

He worries. 

Not only that…

The biggest problem of all is that there are still no eggs to speak of. 

Ninchi can’t understand why! Captain mated him more than enough times to fertilize him! Their first time together, Captain took him no less than four times! Over and over. A night of sparkling pleasure, stormy and warm and forever. Since then, there have been countless times! Surely Captain planted ample seeds inside him! By the usual method, Ninchi should have laid his eggs by now. Then in another moon cycle they would hatch and Ninchi could call the captain a father…

His heart aches with the desire to give children to his beloved. To present him with eggs. To show him those eggs in their shared mind and feel the swell of pride and happiness that would definitely rise within Captain once he saw them. Amazing! Their future family! So special and precious. 

Everything Ninchi has ever wanted.

But…

There are still no eggs. Ninchi sits by the nest every night and waits. He feels his stomach. It is a bit swollen, as if his body is retaining water in preparation for a big slumber, but it does not feel hard. Nothing prominent. No eggs inside waiting to be laid. 

Where are they? 

Ninchi is worried. He wants the eggs now! He grows to care less and less what the other Sharkbloods think. The only thing that matters is Captain! Making sure that his chosen partner has everything he needs (pieces of a ship, a boat, a sail, which Ninchi found tattered on the shores of an island not too far from Captain’s). Providing for his love and their future family. These are the things Ninchi has dedicated himself to. There is no turning back. Even given the option, Ninchi would never turn back. He wouldn’t want to. 

What he wants…

Captain’s arms. Petting him. Telling he’s done a good job. Captain’s stories. His words, his dreams. The desires Ninchi can feel burning in his head whenever they share their thoughts. Hot like fire and urgent. Captain calls this ‘ambition.’ He has a lot of ambition! It’s strong! And it tastes good trapped in the jaws of the blossoming heart underneath Ninchi’s ribs. Delicious, even. Ninchi likes Captain’s ambition. He’ll work hard to make his dreams a reality. 

And when he gives him a child…

Oh, then! Captain will have someone to carry on his legacy! Won’t he love that! Of course, Captain’s head is not filled with thoughts of children (Ninchi should know; he spends enough time reading those thoughts). But that’s only because Captain hasn’t seen the children yet. Once he sees them, he’ll want them. 

The eggs. Once he sees the eggs…

Ninchi stares at his empty nest and despairs. Woeful sorrow and frustration culminate to a hollow cry in his throat. The blank space where his eggs should be is brutal. That space sears Ninchi’s soul and reverberates through his body like the tail of a whip. It hurts.

Nursing his wounds, Ninchi lays the pearl he found that night he spied on Captain in the center of the nest. He strokes the tiny pearl and coos to it, an echoey dolphin-like croon he would use if it were an actual egg. There are many traditional songs to sing to eggs to make them grow big and strong. Ninchi knows them all by heart. He yearns to sing them to his own developing babies. 

He strokes his bloated stomach and wonders....

Is it because Captain is human? Are they not able to mate because they are not the same species?

A horrible thought! No, no, that can’t be true! Lies!

Ninchi is _certain_ he’s heard tales of half-human, half-mer children. Merfolk with legs that find their fins in the sea and walk on land when dry. Ninchi is positive these stories are real. Wasn’t there a mermaid….a Sharkblood woman...who exiled herself years ago when she produced such children…? 

Ah! Yes! There was! Hope blossoms anew in Ninchi’s chest. He remembers her face and the vague direction of the trail she left when she swam away from the clan for the last time. Never to return. If she is still there, then...she would know. She would know about the lamentable emptiness in Ninchi’s nest. Better than he would. 

He should find her. Ask her. 

Captain’s boat is finished. He is plotting a course that will take him back to his homeland. Ninchi does not worry about Captain going to be with other humans. After all, they’re mated! There is no way to break a mated bonding no matter what! Captain is _his_ , forever! Ninchi can feel his presence everywhere. A silvery, tenuous thread that connects them. He will always be able to follow this thread and find his way back to Captain. For the rest of his life (and when he dies, Ninchi will do the same for their children. And their children’s children. And on and on, until the end of time). That connection is stronger than anything the human world has to offer.

Ninchi has nothing to fear from a city full of humans. What he fears lies in his own cave: That stubbornly egg-less nest. 

Fortunately, it looks like the mermaid Ninchi remembers and the human city Shido is headed towards lie in the same direction. Ninchi will find her on their voyage. It’s the only hope! 

And. He must make sure to mate with Captain as much as possible! Day in and day out. Just to be on the safe side! 

The thought of that puts a smile on the Sharkblood boy’s face. Mating with the Captain is easy enough to do, at least.

_____________________

Saying goodbye to the island is a bittersweet exercise. Shido boards his dinghy and gives that sorry plot of sand one last look. Why is he feeling nostalgic? 

Well, he does owe his life to this land. However sorry it might be. This measly island kept him alive all this time. By Shido’s reckoning, five months. He wagers it will take him another month to reach Royal City, and that’s a generous estimate. He’s using The Ark’s ship speed in his calculations. This sorry rig...the Princess Kaguya…

Shido sighs. Steels himself. There is every possibility he’ll end up right back on this island, tossed by the sea and nearly drowned. Again. 

So, he gives the island a cursory salute and embarks on this fool’s journey. Pushing off the sand bank into the endless blue before him. Shido adjusts the helm at the appropriate degree, using a compass Ninchi found for him, and loosens the sail. A brisk wind takes him right away. 

That’s a fortuitous sign. Good. Shido stands at the helm, shielding his eyes from the sun, and steers.

_“You look wonderful, Captain. Truly magnificent.”_

That boy. Shido tightens his lips into a firm line. That boy can speak to Shido now without opening his mouth. Without even touching him. Shido sees a flash of silver and red in the corner of his eye and knows that Ninchi is down there somewhere, swimming alongside the boat and watching him. Always, always watching. Transmitting thoughts to Shido using his foghorn of a head. 

_“Thank you,”_ Shido answers. Testing the length of rope in his mind that tethers him to Ninchi and Ninchi to him. A cord he imagines is thick nautical jute rope. Unseverable. Binding. Shido hoists that rope like a weight in his hands, feeding length to it the same he would for his main sail. 

He knows how to work a rope, doesn’t he?

 _“Was this ship’s virgin sail-make everything you hoped it would be?”_ he asks. Wishing he had a pipe to commemorate the occasion. Or a bottle. 

Lord have mercy. A bottle of something… Shido closes his eyes and nurses the persistent need of a drink that’s been plaguing him these five months of forced sobriety. God, save him. A drink would be divine…

_“Hm? Drink?”_

Ninchi’s head pops out of the water. He touches the side of the ship, near the storage compartment holding Shido’s supply of freshwater, fruit, and crabmeat. _“Are you thirsty? You should drink if your mouth is dry...don’t ignore these things.”_ His mouth turns down and his eyes widen with concern. 

“Not that kind of thirsty...” Shido mutters to himself. 

Damn. He thought he was getting better at shielding his thoughts from this creature. But it turns out...not so. 

Well, it doesn’t help matters that Ninchi has been quite literally throwing himself at Shido lately! Any spare moment they’ve had, Ninchi paws at the space between Shido’s legs. Working his dick with his cold, succinct hands. Blinking at him with giant, owlish eyes. Expectant. “Captain,” he says (sometimes out loud, sometimes in his mind). “Can we?” 

If Shido were a god-fearing man, he’d probably say no. It can’t be kosher how many times he’s fucked this mermaid. Dozens and dozens (or hundreds? Christ!). Even a priest could excuse one or two lapses in judgement, but this many...no. It’s set. It’s done. Enjoying a sea monster’s cunt this much is just decadence. Bold-faced, toe-curling luxury. 

Be that as it may, Shido fears no god or demon. Only impotence. Which he happily lays to rest every time Ninchi crawls on top of him and shakes his scaly little hips.

Sweet boy. Wanting his captain so much! Shido can’t say he minds that part. Honestly it arouses him to think of this mermaid swimming through the seas, aching for him in every way. Leaving a trail of slick behind him, floating in the water like ink. 

Shido smirks underneath his overgrown mustache. Such a good boy. 

But all that sex. It made the telepathic connection between them stronger. By a lot. Quite a lot. Too much, perhaps. Shido can hear Ninchi’s thoughts as far as ten meters apart. 

So. This is Shido’s new reality. 

He’s working on a wall. If not a wall, then a curtain. Drapery that can cover the parts of Shido’s mind he wants to keep hidden. If Shido studies the rope of their connection then he’ll definitely be able to---

“Captain.” 

Shido looks down at the water. Ninchi is holding onto the boat. Staring at him. Staring and staring. A picture Shido will not soon forget in his lifetime. 

“What is it.” His voice is gruff, but his heart is---

“Please take care of yourself.” Ninchi blinks and reaches for him. “I mean it. Don’t do anything reckless.” 

Shido laughs. “How could I be reckless out here?” He gestures to the tiny space within the dinghy. “There’s naught but sea air and watery fish spit. And you, of course.” 

He eyes the boy fondly when he says that. Always. He’ll always have this boy, won’t he? To keep him company on the sea. Shido can’t help the touch of affection that creeps into his soul when he acknowledges that. 

Suddenly, the boy is smiling. “You’re right. But remember: You should use me for the dangerous things. Call on me whenever you need me. Okay?” 

“Dangerous things…?” Shido frowns. He doesn’t know what Ninchi means. 

But the boy doesn’t elaborate. He disappears under the water’s surface as the tiny dinghy sails the first legs of its slow slog across the wide ocean. 

Oh well.

As the day wears on, Shido sings a sea chanty to himself. He does love sailing. He always did. It feels nice to be on the water again, instead of trapped by it. 

He knows Ninchi is listening to his song. So he makes it a really dirty one. Maybe Ninchi will enjoy the sexy bits. That wanton, sex-crazed fish slut. 

What a turn of events. In spite of everything, Shido found himself a pretty treasure on this voyage, didn’t he? A coveted prize indeed! 

But perhaps not one he can take with him on land.

___________________________

The journey is a harrowing one. Several times, Shido finds himself in the middle of a storm. He is forced to steer and man the sail at the same time---pulling the rope like his life depends on it. Which it does. 

More than once, Shido relies on Ninchi’s blessed interference. Shido falls from the boat on several occasions, taken by a strong wind or a fierce wave, and Ninchi grabs him. Carrying him through the waves, keeping his head above water so Shido avoids drowning. On other occasions, Shido’s boat nearly capsizes completely save for Ninchi holding the sides of it upright. 

No matter how rough the waves get or how ugly the storm, Ninchi stays by his side. 

Shido pulls Ninchi’s whole body onto his ship. Just once. After another brutal storm nearly claims his life. He pulls Ninchi up and makes love to him then and there. Both of them still soaked from the sea’s deathgrip. Shido kisses Ninchi hard as he ruts into him. Holding his face between his hands and licking the bristly scales along his cheeks. 

That time, the sex is fueled by a lust for life that is an aphrodisiac like no other. Shido fucks Ninchi with his will to live. An endless fight against mortality that transmutes into fiery, uncompromising desire. 

_“I love you!”_ Shido screams across their connection. Unable to speak, his cock is so hard. He needs to fuck, he needs to drive himself deeper and deeper and deeper--- _“I love you, I love you, fuck, I need you!”_

_“It’s alright. I’m here. I love you, too. Take me!”_

Ninchi holds Shido through it. He presses their heads together and lets Shido scream his love and desire at him. He keens with pleasure and his cunt contracts beautifully around Shido’s cock. Milking him into a release that leaves Shido blind for several minutes afterward. He clasps Shido in his arms, shielding him from the wind and the clouds and any errant dangers that might be lurking in the water’s depths. He shields him from everything. 

When Shido comes back to his senses, he fixes his clothes and wordlessly helps Ninchi back into the ocean. They don’t mention that time again. They don’t have to. It lives on their skin. Balanced permanently on the thread of the connection between them. Comfortable. Indelible. 

Shido tells himself he was taken by madness to admit such things. Even in his mind, a place he can’t control so easily. Shido’s never said words like that aloud to anyone and he certainly doesn’t plan to. 

But the sea has a way of changing a man. Making him face his own death. The prospect of drowning would shock anyone into flowery confessions and nonsense---

Shido tightly holds the memories of that time fucking Ninchi on the dinghy. So tight it can’t breathe. He holds it, cherishing it and suffocating it. In a box where it belongs. 

The journey doesn’t get any easier. He’s running out of supplies. He’s liable to die of thirst. Even with Ninchi’s unwavering assistance, Shido doesn’t know if he’ll survive this trip after all…

Then, one day, he comes upon a ship. At first it was a dot in the distance that he dared not hope for, but after a few days’ time sailing towards it---by God, it’s real! A ship! Carrying real human beings! 

The sailors on board call out to him. Shido calls back as loud as he can. Waving his arms. Nearly out of his mind with relief. 

Humans. Other humans! At last! 

He’s saved. They send out an envoy to retrieve him and pull him up into the main deck, where he asks for a parlay with the ship’s captain. This is a boat in the governor’s charter, he realizes right away. The men are wearing black uniforms. The royal navy. 

“I’m Captain Shido Masayoshi,” he tells them all. Standing as tall as he can wearing nothing but rags, barely able to be heard around the long hair on his face. “My ship, The Ark, went down about six months ago. I’ve been lost at sea all this time. Tell me, who captains this ship?” 

“Shido…”

“Shido Masayoshi?” 

“Could it be…?”

His name gets repeated a few times in wonderment and disbelief. 

Finally the captain reveals himself. A pompous, frail sort of man that Shido has met a few times and recognizes immediately. 

“Captain Madarame.” Shido nods to him in acknowledgement. Holding out his hand to shake. “It’s been a hell of a long time, hasn’t it? Your men just saved my life.”

Madarame grins, shaking Shido’s hand happily. Of course he’s eager to have something to lord over him (‘benevolently,’ of course, such is the posture Madarame always assumes). But Shido will give him that. Since he’s in no position to put on airs at the moment. 

“Shido, you sea dog,” Madarame says through his heavily practiced smile. “The governor’s men were fools to think you dead. Of course the ocean couldn’t claim your life. I’m not nearly as surprised as I should be, seeing you washed up here on my deck.” 

“Well, you’re goddamn right about that.” Shido cups Madarame’s hand in thanks. Nodding at him with a smile that is not short on self-satisfaction. 

His reputation precedes him. Naturally. 

“Come, let’s get you cleaned up and put some decent food in you.” Madarame puts his arm around Shido’s shoulders and walks him into the cabin. “I’m sure you have quite an interesting story to tell, am I right?” 

His story. The story of the past six months. 

Shido glances over his shoulder at the sea. 

_“Ninchi?”_

_“I’m here, Captain. Are you safe?”_

The relief that fills him hearing his boy’s voice is shameful. He follows Madarame into the cabin, clutching the rope of his connection to the boy inside his head. Just in case. He holds it tight. The cabin is dark and it takes Shido’s eyes some time to adjust. This is the first time he’s been away from the sun in six months. 

_“I’m safe, lad. I know these men. They’re giving me food and water and clothes.”_

_“Good. I see where you are. It seems safe enough. Rest well. Eat and drink. Don’t worry. I’m here.”_

Those words echo in Shido’s head as he goes through the motions of becoming a human being again. _“I’m here. I’m here.”_ Shido kisses those words. They set his mind at ease, knowing that although humans are generally distrustful bastards, Shido still has Ninchi. Ninchi will never betray him.

Besides, he’s been with him for six months. Being apart from him for the first time feels strange. Shido finds himself grateful for their connection. Knowing that he is not alone among these men that are little more than strangers.

_“I’m here. I’m here.”_

Shido bathes in clean water, watching sand and salt swirl in the bathwater. He dries himself with a towel and looks at himself in the mirror. The man he sees is someone he does not recognize. The island has made him wild. His hair is down to his chin and his beard is past his shoulders. His skin darkened to a roasted cashew color. His shoulder, back, and arm muscles bulked out considerably, but his waist got distressingly slender. 

Who is this man? Shido stares at him and wonders. Is this the man that survived a shipwreck and sustained himself under the most dire conditions? A man who fell in love with a mermaid and made all kinds of alien promises…?

Shido Masayoshi is not this man. 

He takes a razor to the hair on his chin and head. Shaving himself down to his usual countenance. Bald, with a modest beard and mustache. He finds a spare uniform in a size larger than what he normally wears, big enough to fit his muscles. The familiar caress of civilized clothing reminds him: He is Captain Shido Masayoshi of the first fleet royal navy. That’s who he is. Not the wildman from the island. 

_“I’m here. I’m still here, Captain.”_

Shido closes his eyes and finds the curtain. The imaginary material is heavy in his hands. He should use it. He should use it now to dampen the sound of Ninchi’s voice so that Shido can concentrate on human conversations. He doesn’t want their connection gone---no, no, not gone completely. Just...quieter. Less noticeable. 

There is a knock at the door. “Captain Shido. Madarame-sama has invited you to dinner. Will you be joining him presently?” 

Shido takes another look at himself in the mirror. This. This is a man he recognizes now. 

He lays the curtain over some fictitious, ghostly jute rope. 

“Yes. Thank you.”

___________________________

Ninchi swims near the large, human boat for three days. He stays out of sight from the other humans and calls to Captain constantly. Sometimes he gets an answer. Most of the time he does not. 

Captain must be very busy! Meeting with people of his own kind. 

Fortunately, Ninchi can still watch everything that’s happening from inside Captain’s mind. There is a strange fuzziness blocking him from Captain’s feelings---cloudy, murky detritus preventing him from sharing everything as he normally would---but he can still see exactly what Captain sees. The people here look like him. They all wear black with shiny things on their chests and shoulders. Medals. Ninchi doesn’t like that Captain lost his medals in the ocean. He looks less important than these other men and that isn’t right! 

Ninchi wishes he saved Captain’s medals back then. He doesn’t remember what happened to them. That’s a shame. 

The only communication he has with Captain is sparse. Ninchi always asks if he needs anything. And Captain always says, _“I’m alright. I’m fine.”_

Hmm. Ninchi doesn’t understand why there’s something heavy weighing on their connection. He doesn’t like it, but at least he knows that Captain is fine. He feels for the blackness that indicates Captain is asleep, and then he sets out on his own journey. 

Sharkbloods will always be able to find each other in the sea. Their blood leaves a kind of scent in the water. As the ship approaches the human city (they were headed in the same direction as Captain), Ninchi smells the scent of another Sharkblood and he knows in his bones that it must be her. 

She lives all the way out here? So close to the humans… 

That makes sense.

Ninchi follows her scent to a deep, dark grotto. He feels around for the pulse of another merperson’s conscience but doesn’t sense anything. So, he dives into the grotto and follows it upwards to a cave. The water opens into a shallow pool that gives way to land. The cave is deep underwater but there is land here as well. A human might be able to survive if they---

All at once, he feels her. 

Sharped, barbed tongues and claws digging. Pain and disgust, she’s pushing him away. Through her mind and also physically---she’s grabbed him by the shoulders and is dragging him back through the grotto. 

_“Wait!”_

He imagines his human. Babies. The image he has of half-mer, half-human babies. He imagines it and gives her everything. Defenses down, no walls. He has nothing to hide. He came here for her. Only for her help. 

She stops. Drags him back to the cave. Into the light. 

She is beautiful. Long, silvery grey hair and bright yellow eyes. A thin, pointy face and spindly waist. Her breasts are full but proportional to her figure, and they hang against her body like teardrops. Her scales are black and gold, shimmering in the sunlight. Heavy black lines frame her eyes, like a human’s make-up, but these lines are part of her skin. There are other marks on her, too. On her back. A drawing. Chains and a land creature. How…? 

Ninchi hasn’t seen her in a hundred years. She’s changed. Those black marks weren’t there. And her vicious defenses! She’s become dangerous. Fighting for her survival out here against anyone who would trespass on her grotto. 

But even so. She’s a Sharkblood. Her teeth are sharp and her blood cannot lie. Seeing her feels like welcoming back an old family member. Ninchi is happy he found her. 

They swim in circles around each other for a few minutes. She scrutinizes his face. Blinking against the thoughts in his head that he wants to share. Thoughts about his human, the questions about his eggs. His love. His wishes. She takes all those thoughts and absorbs them without giving anything back. All Ninchi’s secrets disappear inside her like coins dropped down a bottomless well. 

Eventually, she lets her guard down long enough to let some of her own thoughts through. 

She has a name! Her human gave her one too! Ah, he was a beautiful man! Dead now for forty years. But he gave her a lovely name: 

Leviathan. 

And her children! Two of them, and three more grandchildren. They don’t call her Leviathan, though. They call her something else: Sae. A much more human name apparently.

‘Sae’ is a good name too. But Ninchi likes ‘Leviathan’ better. 

So does she. 

She sees his distress. His worry about how he has not produced any eggs. When she sees that, she smiles. Shaking her head, her grey hair fanning out behind her, part of the backdrop. Then, she lets Ninchi see what she went through. Bearing children for a human.

The pain is what Ninchi feels first. It’s not eggs. No, no. That’s not how humans do it. A baby---the baby comes out---through---

Ninchi shudders and clutches his abdomen. He blinks around the images of Leviathan’s pregnancy. The baby develops _inside_ and then it is _born_. Alive! There are no eggs, it’s more like...Ninchi’s body is the egg. And the baby is already there! Its heart is beating! 

_“Can’t you feel it?”_ Leviathan asks. Her mind voice is low and deep. Sultry, inviting in a way. 

Ninchi concentrates all his energy on his stomach. His womb, more accurately. The place that he now knows he has. And when he focuses really hard....

_“I can.”_

He can. It’s there! Fluttering like the fins of a tiny minnow. A child. Half-human, half-mer. Just one, but it’s alive and well. It’s been living inside of him for three months. 

_“Twelve weeks is early,”_ Leviathan informs him. _“You’ve still got a ways to go.”_

The baby stays inside for nine months. That’s a long time! Eggs are hatched in half that time, but humans come out already fully formed. It takes a while for them to get all their parts. Their legs and everything else. Surely after it gestates, it will be able to live on its own! 

_“Not quite,”_ Leviathan interjects with a short laugh. 

She explains everything. There’s so much Ninchi doesn’t know! It takes a while and many pictures before he gets the idea of what his baby will need once it’s born. What Ninchi will need in order to keep the baby alive for the next thirty weeks or so. It’s complicated and...frightening, in a way. Knowing that his body is now egg and nest and mother. On the other hand, it’s a relief! Carrying his baby with him all the time means he will be able to protect it better. Without worrying about leaving the baby in a nest. 

He’s also very, _very_ excited. There’s a child! His union with Captain made a baby! And soon enough, they will have a family together. Once Captain sees the baby---! 

Ninchi asks Leviathan for her help. It takes her a moment, but she agrees. She’ll help. He clasps his hands and wags his tail in thanks. Things are not so frightening knowing that he has someone from the clan here with him! A true brethren. Someone who understands. Who has loved a human as well. 

Ninchi can’t wait to tell Captain everything! As soon as that weird net around their connection clears up...

He lays a hand on his stomach and gently pats the child that is developing inside. It’s more intimate than an egg, which Ninchi would have loved too. But since they are sharing a body for the next six months...it feels like a part of him. Not just offspring. This baby is also _him_. Who he is. His person.

Who they all are. Captain, Ninchi. And even this baby. Together, inside of him! 

Regardless, Ninchi will make sure to take time to love on this baby just as much as he would an egg! Sing songs to it. Share thoughts with it. Teach it about its people, both mermaid and human. Whatever Ninchi knows. 

This child will know everything by the time it’s born! 

And whatever it still doesn’t know, Captain can teach it. 

______________________________ 

It takes another month at sea for the ship to reach Royal City. Madarame and his crew are on a return voyage from abroad, a run of the mill affair. Shido counts himself extremely lucky that he found them. It must have been fate. 

Back amongst his kind, Shido slips into the roles he’s used to playing. A man of the people. Reserved but polite enough to your face (unless you cross him, which very few people are dumb enough to do). Comfortable in a place of leadership, giving demands and assigning tasks. He orders Madarame’s crew around without a second thought, since he outranks them. Of course, Madarame’s men don’t hesitate to follow his orders (either because of his title or his reputation).

It feels good to be in his old skin again. But he knows he won’t feel one hundred percent right until he has a crew of his own to command.

He spends little to no time talking to Ninchi, although he hears him in the back of his mind constantly. 

_“Captain? Are you there?”_

_“What’s going on? Are these men treating you well?”_

_“Captain, talk to me.”_

_“I have something to tell you.”_

Shido brushes off the pressure against his consciousness and tries to focus on human conversations. He plays rounds of chess with Madarame and writes letters upon letters to the governor and people in his office. He tells rousing stories of his adventures to the crew well into the night, giving credence to some of the stories told about him. Particularly of his encounters with pirates.

“Remember, all men have desires,” Shido tells the crew, huddled around a lantern listening to his tales. “Learn how to use them and you’ll get the better of them every time.”

The men nod in understanding. Sharing looks of appreciation. 

“I can’t believe you were able to convince those pirates to mutiny.” 

“Loyalty doesn’t run strong in that lot, eh….” 

_“I love your stories, Captain.”_

Shido winces as he hears Ninchi’s voice mixed in with that of the young men onboard. If he peers over the edge of the ship, he will see him. That boy. Flashing his red and silver scales. Smiling. Staring at him with those dull, animal eyes that have seen so very much of Shido’s soul---

“Tell us again how you survived that storm, Captain Shido. The rest of your crew perished at sea, no?” 

Of course Shido has concocted a story (not too dissimilar from the truth) of what happened to him when The Ark went down. He tells them that he drifted to an uncharted island and survived off the land. It’s not a very exciting story on face value, but Shido leans heavily on the descriptions of his own injuries. Simultaneously explaining the slight limp he has now and filling their thirst for tales of grisly hardship. To be fair, it was hard dragging his immobile body around that island for months. He doesn’t need to explain how his wounds were healed---he says he set the bones himself---he just needs to explain how they happened and how he survived. 

He would never tell any living soul about Ninchi. Or about any of the mermaid society he tangentially discovered. For several reasons. One, no one is liable to believe him and they might think Shido mad. Two, upon learning of such things, most humans would want to find the mermaids for themselves. They would scour the seas for them so they can steal the secret of their longevity. Shido cannot allow that; he cannot allow the boy to be hurt. 

He just can’t. Those merfolk don’t deserve that. 

Three, most obvious of all, Shido doesn’t want anyone to entertain the notion of any potential lapse in judgement on his part. Particularly when it comes to the boy. Any rational man would question, that after six months, wouldn’t you...with him? That’s just common sense! But Shido doesn’t want to put those thoughts in people’s heads.

So he’ll tell no one. Ever. He’ll take the secret of the beautiful, perfect mermaid boy to his grave. 

One night, as they get closer to the city (close enough to see the lights from the distance), Ninchi sings to Shido. His siren song. A call meant only for him. Shido hears the music and something painful twists in his heart. He leaps from his desk and runs to the side of the deck. The night wind slaps him in the face as it passes across the cold sea, but Shido doesn’t feel it. He’s out of his mind with _need,_ a lust he feels only when he’s buried to the hilt inside Ninchi. A driving pulse of biological imperative. He needs his boy. He needs to hold him. He needs to---

“Do you hear that? Sounds like a dolphin.” The night watchmen speak to each other from the crow’s nest. 

“Dolphin? More like a gull I think.”

“Are you serious? What gull makes sounds like that, chattering and such?” 

“Eerie is what it is…”

The others are immune to Ninchi’s call. Because Shido is the chosen mate, the song only affects him. He knew that, but. The juxtaposition of such a tremendous power hits him differently when faced with reality like this. Ninchi’s song is beautiful to Shido. The most intoxicating, poignant melody he’s ever heard! But to everyone else it’s barely more than the chattering of a dolphin. 

And that music holds such sway over Shido…

He curses foully under his breath and descends to the lower deck. He opens the bay windows wide, only a meter or so above sea level, and calls to his boy. 

“Ninchi?” he hisses. Whispering, glancing above and around him to make sure no one will overhear. 

Sure enough, the boy appears out of the water. Pale skin and sharp teeth. Silver scales glittering in the moonlight. 

“Captain. You heard my song.” He seems quite pleased with himself. 

“Of course I did,” Shido tuts. His arms still long to hold this boy, but his anger is rising as well. He’s being manipulated. _Manipulated_ , by this sea monster! 

That’s the perfect way to rankle Shido Masayoshi.

“What do you want?” he spits. Paranoid about being overheard.

“Ah, I have so much to tell you!” The boy flips his tail out of the water with a loud splash. “I found out---”

“Quiet! What are you doing?” Shido holds out his hands, gesturing downward. Beseeching him to make less noise. “They can’t find you here, understand? That can’t happen.” 

Confusion slants across Ninchi’s face. “Why?”

Foolish question! There’s every reason why! “Because it’s not safe!” Shido lands on. He blinks around pictures of poachers and feckless, bloodthirsty humans in his head, which he hopes reach the boy. 

Incongruously, Ninchi breaks into a smile. “I see. Captain is protecting me.” 

Shido sighs. He is. Even though the matter of his pride and reputation are on the line. At the end of the day he’s still protecting Ninchi. “I am,” he admits. “Now, make sure you stay out of sight. Don’t sing to me again. Swim where they can’t see or hear you. We can’t talk to each other like this.” 

Ninchi’s owlish eyes blink. Unsure. “...Okay. Whatever you say, but...I still want to tell you---” 

A noise from the deck above startles Shido. 

“Oi! Who’s out there!” A sailor pokes his head out of his window and scans the sea. 

Panicked, Shido waves Ninchi away and darts back into the cabin. Luckily the boy is smart enough to dive underwater before the nosy sailor catches sight of him. Just like that, he’s gone. Shido closes the bay windows and retires back to his rooms. Fighting the lurking feeling of being pursued. 

The following day, he has trouble making eye contact with any of the crew members. There’s still a chance someone found out. Someone might have seen. Ninchi and his familiarity with Shido---

_“Captain, when can I talk to you? I won’t sing, I promise. But I have to say something. I want you. I miss you. Captain? Captain?”_

Shido curls his hands into fists. Piling curtain on top of curtain over their connection. Pushing the boy away. Trying with all his might!

“Whiny, clingy little slag...…” 

“Hm? Shido-san? Did you say something?” Madarame looks up from the chessboard and regards Shido with a dubious expression.

He forces himself to remember where he is. In Madarame’s captain quarters. With real people. _Humans_. Shido shakes his head. “No, not at all. Have you taken your turn yet?” 

“Not yet. Don’t rush me, good sir. Have you no mercy for your lessers in this game?” Madarame chuckles in self-deprecation (which would certainly switch to legitimate hatred if Shido turned his back for half a second). He eyes the chessboard again, searching for a move.

At least Shido can barely hear Ninchi now. It sounds like he’s speaking from somewhere down the street. Barely audible from such a distance. 

Like this, maybe Shido can stay sane.

_______________________

Not a moment after the ship docks, Shido pushes his way through the crowd into the firm, cobblestone streets of Royal City. 

Solid ground. Finally. 

_“Captain? There are so many people swimming around you! It’s a lot, I can’t---”_

“Eager to be home?” Madarame appears behind Shido and claps him on the back. 

Rushing forward, Shido smothers his connection to Ninchi and tries to hide the dismay on his face. The frustration. The sickness. Shido is _sick_ of fish boys and gulls and creaky wooden decks and promises and storms and harrowing, life-threatening adventures! 

So fucking sick. 

“Eager to see our lordship,” he replies to Madarame. “Perhaps more than most.” 

Madarame chuckles. “That’s understandable. I’m sure the governor received your letters and is anxious to meet with you, too. Best not keep him waiting! To the Municipal House with you.” 

Obviously, you daft bastard. Where else? Shido rolls his eyes out of view and then turns crisply to Madarame. He salutes him properly. “I owe you my life, sir,” he says. “There’s no way I could ever repay you, but if you discover a matter that can use my attention, come to my office. I’d be happy to investigate and do what I can. Check a few boxes, spare a second glance. Alright?”

Madarame’s cynical eyes flash greedily. Of course. This is what he’s been waiting to hear for the past month! A chance to cash in on saving Shido’s life: The coveted promise of a favor from Shido Masayoshi. This is no small thing. Shido has moved men from obscurity to marquisdom over the course of such favors. Madarame surely has dozens of things he’d like to request. 

Sure enough, he begins to say, “Actually, there is a small matter---”

_“Is this your home, Captain? It’s noisier than I thought. So much talking! Do your ears hurt at night? Where is your bed? Where do you sleep? I want to see---”_

“My office,” Shido grumbles, practically stumbling over his own feet as he rushes further inland. “We’ll discuss this there.”

Without looking back, he takes off towards the Municipal House at a brisk walk. Practically a run. He needs to get away---away from the sea---as far inland as he can get! The seething mass of the city’s common population hardly registers as he shoulder-checks them out of the way. 

In the city’s center, he comes upon a white stone building several dozen stories high. Here, his office. The office of all high-level government workers. The goalpost for any self-respecting navy man or political underdog, the Municipal House.

And here, landlocked on all sides. Shido’s head is blissfully silent. He takes a long breath. Gathers himself. 

At last, he is alone. There are hundreds of people swarming around him, but like this, Shido can finally be alone. Inside his own skin. Away from the boy. Beyond the limits of their telepathy, his beseeching voice. 

He feels more human than he has since The Ark went down. He rolls his shoulders and holds his head up high. He is a man. A captain. 

A human.

He marches into the building to meet with the governor. 

“Well, well. I can’t say I expected to see you again, Shido. Even now you’re full of surprises.” The governor regards him from behind wide glasses, wearing his infamous half-smile.

Shido removes his hat respectfully and holds it to his chest. “Sir. It’s my honor to be back. Albeit later than I anticipated.” 

The governor laughs heartily. A very rare thing. He reaches into his desk and pulls out a glass bottle of something delightfully brown. “I’m sure. A man like you? Must have been torture for you on that island alone with no one to swob your decks or polish those heavy, seaman’s boots. Am I wrong?” 

Shido’s cheek twitches in irritation. He plops into the seat anyway. “Not wrong.” When the governor finishes pouring him a drink, Shido practically pounces on it. He downs it in one go, his gullet singing in relief. Welcoming the burn of that alcohol like a close old friend. 

He’s home. This whiskey tastes like home.

The governor chuckles at the spectacle. “Yeah, I bet your whistle was dry. You old lush. I have to admit, I’m shocked you came to my office first before going to that whorehouse on Chapel Street. The one you love so much. What was it called, Mermaid’s Clutch?” 

Shido holds out his glass. Silently demanding more drink.

And yes, that is the name of the establishment he frequented most often. Sort of an unfortunate title now. What a shame. 

The governor obliges him. “Actually I’m a little touched. Did you really miss my old mug more than the tender arms of a girl with her skirts hiked up to her ass? Come now. There was no reason to rush over here.” 

Shido lets the whiskey sit on his tongue for a while before swallowing. This man. This governor---Okumura Kunikazu is his name, a man Shido knew before he was anything, whom Shido has buoyed to this lofty position with his own clout and a fair bit of skullduggery---is a blackhearted man. Naturally. Well-bred from an esteemed family, and upstanding to the letter of the word in his public life (bitter and callous in private). Once upon a time Okumura was ruthlessly attractive, now he’ll have to settle for simply ‘dashing.’ The wrinkles in his face have sunk so deep they look like scars, old knife wounds. His round eyes sit hollowly in his face. Blaring lighthouse beacons that fail to miss anything presented before him, except for the things he knows he is meant to miss. The convenient things. As a matter of course.

In the entire time Shido has known Okumura, he’s learned everything there is to know about him. And though Okumura is the scummiest of the scum, greedy and without any hint of scruples, Shido has never known Okumura to be a lecher. 

Something is off. 

Shido frowns. “Glad to see you’re familiar with the girls at the Clutch.” He watches one of Okumura’s eyes twitch. A man like him would never be caught dead in a place like that! But then how could he talk so crassly about it? The dissonance is palpable. 

Catching his mistake, Okumura schools his face quickly. 

“But as you know, a man needs to settle his business affairs before running off to enjoy life’s sweeter fruits.” Shido finishes his drink and leaves the empty glass on the desk. He doesn’t want any more of Okumura’s whiskey. “The account has been emptied, I expect?” 

“Naturally.” The governor leans back in his chair. “Without your man’s funding, what money was there to sustain it?” 

Shido nods. His man: A wooden-toothed pirate who went by the (sadly underwhelming) name Jack Knife. His trade: Opium, mostly. And other illegal goods. Shido and Okumura have been in business with him under the table for years. Half of Okumura’s campaign funding comes from Jack Knife’s business, with the understanding the Jack Knife’s ship will go undetected by the authorities. Sailing with impunity. 

Such is the way of the world. 

Between the two of them, the only one with any direct contact with Jack Knife is Shido. Okumura doesn’t have the stomach for such a man, and they can only meet in pirate territory. So without Shido’s assistance the past six months, no doubt Okumura’s coffers are more than a pit pinched. 

“Put some more money in,” Shido instructs. “I can have another shipment for you by the first of next month.” 

“That soon?” Okumura raises his eyebrows. “But you’ve only just returned. Besides, how do you know your man hasn’t gone into business with someone else in your absence?” 

Shido shakes his head. “Don’t be ridiculous. I’m telling you, there’s a heap of gold with your name on it. Accumulating in the hull of some blackflag ship in the western sea. With interest. It’s just a matter of sailing out there to get it.” 

At that, the governor visibly swallows. How could a man like him be indifferent to such vivid imagery? No doubt Okumura can smell the gold from here, with his avaricious nose. “Is that so...” he says. 

But his voice trails off.

Shido doesn’t like the sound of that. 

His gaze turns metallic. Hard, unflinching. “And my position? What’s become of my charter? Have there been plans to rebuild The Ark yet?” He doesn’t add the next question, which he doesn’t want to even consider: ‘Under whose command?’

The governor waves his hand. “Slow down. This is why I said you should have gone to the whorehouse first. You’re too impatient, you need to kick off your boots and find some girl to put her tongue to work on your toes---”

“My charter, Okumura. Enough of your nonsense.” Shido is growling now. Staring at the governor like he’s moments away from running him through with a sword. “Who the fuck did you give my job to?” 

Leaning back in his chair, the governor sighs with defeat. “I knew you would be unreasonable about this. But you must understand, you were dead! And the world kept on turning. There is a city to run and needs to be met whether you’re here or not---”

“So.” Shido crosses his arms over his chest. Glaring daggers. “The ink on my death certificate isn’t even dry and you’re off giving my position to some second-rate buffoon. Pitiful.” He chews the last word and spits it out with contempt. 

Okumura rushes to defend himself. He knows he’s a money-grubbing asshole who can’t bear to see the numbers in his account dip even a little. But it’s shameful when brought to his face like this! “That’s easy for you to say! In reality, my election is coming up in six months and I can’t afford sentimentality---”

“How soon did he say he can get it done.” Shido knows his own strengths and he’ll play to them. This is war, although it has rapidly become a pissing contest. Whatever that man---that disgusting, inconsequential slime---who took his position has claimed to be able to do, Shido can outmatch. Ten times over! 

The governor adjusts his glasses. “Well, at the time he said it would take four months...” 

Shido snorts. Four months?! What, is he planning to woo Jack Knife with love letters? Amateurish! Good thing Shido claimed to be able to accomplish this in three weeks---

“And he’s already been at sea for over three months, so…”

Wait. That means…

This pathetic, greedy piece of---

“You’ve sent him out already. He’s on the return journey, isn’t he.” Shido’s face goes slack with disappointment and abject hatred. 

The governor nods. Not meeting Shido’s gaze. “...That’s correct.” 

So. That’s it. The side job with Jack Knife is no longer possible because someone else has already taken it. And as for Shido’s official position, his job as captain in the governor’s navy, that’s also up in the air. A man might not slip back into the folds so easily after he’s been replaced.

His office. His salary. His pension. His good name. What’s to become of these things? 

The first few licks of despair lap at Shido’s heart. He thought...he’d thought it would be simple to be back. Once he got here---Royal City, at last!---he thought the hard part would be over! He crossed tempest seas and bided his time with a briny fish cunt to stay sane, all so that he could return to this horseshit?! 

He hadn’t really considered the idea that he’d be replaced. Even though he probably should have. Especially knowing Okumura inside and out as he does. 

Evidently seeing the downtrodden look on Shido’s face, Okumura begins to offer consolation prizes. “Look. Go home. Go get shellacked and sleep it off with a pretty girl for a few days. Or a few weeks. Once my man has returned, we can revisit things. For now, it’s best you lay low and try to adjust---”

“A name.” Shido’s grip on his captain’s hat is so tight the rim is bending.

The governor bristles and shakes his head. “That’s not necessary. It won’t do any good---”

“I asked for a name.” Shido should at least know the name of the man who thinks he’s good enough to do what only Shido can! 

Sighing, Okumura relents. “Kobayakawa. He’s been a distinguished first mate for almost fifteen years. This is his first captain position, so it’s reasonable to say he’s on probation…” 

Kobayakawa. Where has Shido heard that name? He knows the names of every first mate in the king’s service, as well as the captains and even the second mates, just to have a handle on his competition. Kobayakwa sounds familiar but Shido is having trouble remembering the face.

The walls of the governor’s office are adorned with artwork. One painting shows a lake scene with thick-throated frogs relaxing on lily pads.

Now Shido remembers. 

“Kobayakwa?!” That oversized, unambitious, mealy mouthed cretin! Toad-like in both appearance and demeanor! Barely capable of holding command over a gaggle of dimwitted flies, nonetheless a ship! 

That’s who Okumura found to replace him?! 

It seems the gods are not finished laughing at Shido. 

“Tell me you’re joking.” 

“Insult Kobayakawa all you like, but he’s dependable.” The governor puts away his bottle of whiskey and retrieves a cigar. Lighting it up in Shido’s face. Refusing to offer him one in return. 

A power move. And Shido’s mouth waters at the smell of the smoke. He could use a smoke in the worst way…

“Plus, he knows the ins and outs of the business as well as any seadog who’s been at this for a while. Better, I’d say, since people look down on him and underestimate his observation skills.” 

Observation skills. Observation skills?! If Shido slits his throat, how good will those observation skills turn out to be---

“But the problem here,” Okumura exhales smoke in Shido’s direction. Purposefully trying to weaken his resolve. “Is not Kobayakawa at all. I could have found anyone to replace you, Shido. There was a gaping hole in my fleet when you disappeared. Things were out of balance. When I offered him the captainship, he took it. I explained the, ah, unsavory bits of the job as well and he agreed without hesitation. Said he had business with pirates in the war. So I gave him the position. Simple as that.”

Simple? Simple as throwing a man’s whole life and career away without a moment’s pity? No, fuck pity! Okumura did this all without common sense! 

“If he gets his neck snapped out there in rogue waters, what will you do then?” Shido smoothes his hand over his hat. Trying to calm down. 

“Cross that bridge when I get to it, I suppose,” Okumura offers. “Let’s see what happens.” 

He stands. Reaching for an unlit cigar and showing it off. “In the meantime, have a smoke. Hire a whore, have some fun. Relax. I’ll call you if I need you.” 

When Okumura offers him the cigar, Shido stands abruptly. Pushing his hand away with his chest. His steely eyes rake over Okumura one last time, before he storms out of the office without a second glance.

Being on the island with Ninchi for so long, Shido somehow forgot the treachery of regular people. Ninchi was always loyal. Even now, he’s probably out there by the docks, waiting. Eyes scanning the shore. As bright and expectant as ever! 

The despair and disappointment in his heart mix with a hard dose of yearning. A kind of homesickness Shido was used to feeling when he was on the island, whenever he thought about Royal City. Now he’s feeling the same way, but in reverse….

Without thinking, Shido reaches for the rope in his mind, that lifeline, that connection---

No, no. He’s done with that! He can’t. Shido balls his hands into fists and shakes his head. He can’t depend on a mermaid like this. He’s no fish, no sea monster! He’s a man. No matter what tragedies befall him here, Shido will never be anything less than a man. For God’s sake! 

It’s high time he started acting like it. 

Okumura is a good-for-nothing piece of dogshit. But Shido is about to go take his advice all the same.

___________________

Captain will be back. 

Ninchi swims from one side of the city’s shore to the other. Back and forth. Peeking his head out of the water from time to time, when it’s safe enough. There are so many humans here! Way more than Ninchi imagined! After learning what Captain thinks of other humans, Ninchi is adamant about not meeting any of them! 

He doesn’t need any other human, anyway. His curiosity has been slaked. 

He just needs Captain. 

It’s getting dark. Then, it starts to get light. Just like that, the night has turned into daytime and Captain has still not returned to the sea to fetch him.

It’s the longest time they’ve ever spent apart. Outside the reaches of their bond. Their connection is stretched so far the only thing Ninchi can hear is white noise. A terrifying kind of silence. He can’t hear Captain right now, so...

He’s in distress. His heart thuds ominously in natural fear. Mated pairs don’t often spend time beyond the limits of each other's thoughts. When they do, the moments are brief. Only out of necessity! The fear settling in Ninchi’s bones grows larger and larger every minute---

Where’s Captain? Where is he? When will he be back? It’s been hours. Humans went to sleep and now they’re waking up and returning to the wooden planks on top of the water where the ships go. It’s so noisy where the ships are. Ninchi doesn’t like staying around all that noise! His sensitive ears throb with pain whenever he hears one of those loud metal cups---bells!

That can’t be good for the baby to hear.

He dives down deep into the water, clutching his stomach. He lays on the sandy ocean floor and rubs his palm over his thickening belly. In the past month, he’s grown so much larger! Sometimes, he can feel jabs on the inside. A baby who wants to move its arms and...legs, maybe. If it has those. 

The baby is strong. Of course it is. It’s Captain’s! 

Smiling, Ninchi coos and clucks to his stomach. Running his fingers across his navel where his skin has grown tight. Very soon, perhaps, he’ll be able to hear this child’s thoughts. Leviathan said she spoke to her children before they were born, the same way merfolk speak to each other. Ninchi can’t wait to hear what this baby thinks about the world so far! Is it fun inside of him? Is the baby playing? Eating? Swimming? 

Most likely, it is planning, Ninchi thinks. Dreaming. So ambitious. Like its father! 

Full to the brim with pride and incipient eagerness, Ninchi’s loneliness shrinks to a manageable size. He pushes away the fear singing across his nerve endings, willing that to shrink as well. He doesn’t want the baby to know fear yet. It’s not even born! Surely, if Ninchi can hear its thoughts, then the baby can hear and feel the things inside Ninchi’s mind. 

So he must give the baby hope. 

Captain will return.

He must. 

He will.

Certainly he will.

Very soon, now.

Very, very soon. 

Captain will return and hold us in his strong arms.

He will.

___________________

“Another of these.” Shido pushes his empty pint across the counter, over to the barmaid. 

He has not gone to the Clutch. He came close. His feet carried him to the doorway and he stood outside for nearly a full minute, mulling over his options. But when he saw the outline of a mermaid carved into the overhead sign, a woman with long hair covering her tits, arms outstretched, faceless---Shido couldn’t stomach it. He turned on his heels and marked into a dark, nameless street. 

Now he’s in a random bar in a part of the city he’s never been before. Surrounded by men from various walks of life. Some laughing uproariously with friends, some alone, weeping into their cups. The barmaids here are full of smiles and lighthearted jokes. Shido’s server is a blonde woman with big tits who has winked at him no less than three times. She’s eyeing his uniform and his captain’s cap, unabashedly. Not in the least bit ashamed. 

That suits Shido just fine.

But first, a proper meal. 

He ordered a steak and a full pint of beer the second he walked in the door. He downed the pint in a single, flawless swallow (uninterested in the applause from various bar patrons at the sight). Now he’s on his third pint already. 

This is what a man needs, Shido tells himself, digging into the steak and chasing the juicy, meaty taste with more beer. On Madarame’s ship there was nothing but red wine and sailor boys’ bootlegged moonshine. Subsistence, really. Not to mention the fact that most of their meals consisted of cooked fish in white sauce. Apparently Madarame’s favorite.

If Shido ever sees another dish of fish, he’s going to kill someone. He’s going to lose his mind entirely and surrender his soul to the devil, foregoing sanity and decency in the name of divine fire---

“You’re a meat and potatoes guy, aren’t you?”

The barmaid is back. Shido glances up at her, bringing his beer to his lips. She’s attractive enough. Her shirt is missing no less than two buttons it ought to have, but the effect is a heaving set of cleavage balance precariously an inch from Shido’s nose. Her lipstick is too red, but her eyes are a lovely shade of blue. She’s not a young girl, but she’s not old either. Perhaps rounding her mid-thirties. Shido wouldn’t be surprised if he saw a wedding ring on her finger, or a tan line indicating its usual presence. 

He doesn’t check. 

“Indeed I am,” he answers, smiling at her on one side of his face. 

She chuckles. “Yeah. I could tell. You want some more where that came from?” She gestures with her chin towards Shido’s empty plate. “On the house, for a member of the king’s service.” 

Finally. Decent treatment. Shido’s shoulders straighten themselves with pride and he passes her his plate without any hesitation. “I’d be much obliged, thank you.” 

She flashes him a toothy smile and takes his plate. “Don’t mention it, soldier.” 

“I’m not a soldier,” Shido corrects automatically. “I’m a navy man.” 

“That right?” Grinning wider, she leans on the counter with both elbows. Her voluptuous breasts spill over her loosely tied corset, capturing Shido’s full attention with extra helpings of pillowy, soft flesh. “Well, army or navy, a man in uniform still salutes the flag with his right hand, no?” 

Shido stares at her breasts without bothering to disguise his lust. “That’s correct.” 

She laughs airily. “Thought so. And in your case, sir, I bet it’s a straight, proper salute, isn’t it? Tight around the wrist to keep it good and hard. Am I right?” 

It’s been a while since Shido has been in the company of a woman. Over a year, in fact. Before he was stranded on the island, he’d been making do with the young recruits on his ship for far too long. 

How he’s missed women. Gently swaying bodies with quivering skin in all the right places. This woman in front of him looks better and better with every gulp of beer, and her attitude is exactly the kind of thing Shido likes best. Up front. Honest. A bit of wordplay to ease the tension. But her intentions couldn’t be more clear.

Shido gets it up quickly. One part of him wants to bend the barmaid over the counter and fuck her right there. Hike up her skirts and sink into her warm heat regardless of who can see. Take full advantage of the invitation she’s hinting at, slam into her when she’s on her knees like a dog. Slap her ass and tug at those big, swinging tits. He wants to fuck her until she cums in a glorious spurt of wetness, the lord’s name on her lips. He wants to find his way to her asshole and fuck her there, too. The human parts of a woman that Shido knows by heart, the tastes, the smells, the sights. The things he’s been deprived of!

Shido wants her _now_. 

Lately he’s been…

His head hurts in a strange way. Behind his eyes, there is a type of pressure. Not painful, but uncomfortable. A weight in his throat. There’s something missing inside of him and it definitely has to do with sex. Shido’s vision sometimes goes blurry and his mind conjures sensations he knows all too well. Scales under his fingers. A voice as clear as angel’s but low as a devil’s. The smell of seawater, crusty, briny sand, and sweet pea cream---

Fuck. Shido is so hard in his uniform pants. He has half a mind to bury his face in this woman’s freely-offered tits without a second thought! 

There’s something wrong with him, Shido realizes. He’s always been a horny bastard, but this is different. Now it’s like he can’t even think around the need to fuck. There’s a scythe inside his veins, sawing away at his sinews every second he’s not buried to the hilt inside of someone. His arms and his chest are calling, screaming. He wants---

Is Ninchi still out there? Waiting for him? Is he feeling this pain, too?

“I’d love to see your salute sometime, sir,” the woman continues. “Maybe you could show it to me somewhere it’s just the two of us. In honor of the king and all.” She winks at him again. 

Shido huffs hot breath around his mustache. He needs to _stop_. He needs to get himself together and stop thinking about that needy little fish! He’s home now. The island is the island, whatever happened there need not follow him here! There’s a mouthwatering meal in front of him and Shido should be focusing on that more than anything else!

“I’d be delighted to,” he answers. Boldly, he holds her chin in one hand and sweeps his thumb under her bottom lip. It’s an intimate gesture most men wouldn’t try on a first go, but Shido is an old, practiced hand. He gobbles up the woman’s blush like a sweet drink. 

Hoping to get drunk. 

“I get off work in an hour,” she says, bringing her voice down. Blinking around his forward kind of charm. Clearly smitten. 

“I’ll wait, then,” Shido offers. Even though he doesn’t want to. 

So, while Shido waits for the barmaid to be finished with her shift, Shido drinks more. As the crowd dwindles, he orders something harder than beer. A stiff drink of whatever’s on tap. Tastes like scotch. 

He tries not to think of Okumura. That sloven, bug-eyed snake Kobayakawa. Those nearsighted fool profiting off Shido’s demise. He hates them with a passion and would do anything to see them burn. If only this were the uncharted seas and anything went. A duel to the death. Fisticuffs. Cannon fights between ships---

Although, Shido has no ship either.

What is he, without a ship? Without his title? What is he going to do if the governor doesn’t accept him back into service? Should he return to his hometown and work on a fishing boat, like his father did and his father’s father---

Fuck. 

He’d rather die. 

He downs his drink too fast and eyes the barmaid haughtily. Her hips swing just right when she walks. Thank the lord for that. Shido watches her movements for the rest of the night. 

He can’t give in to despair. He’ll find a way to sort this all out. Like he always does. Shido can work his way out of any situation. Hell, he came back from the dead didn’t he! 

This is just another bump in the road. A run-in with clingers-on and greedy fools. Yet again.

Shido will win in the end.

For sure. Somehow. 

“Ready, sir?” The barmaid appears at his side.

“Very much so, yes.” 

__________________

The barmaid’s lodgings are dismal in the wrong kind of way. Nothing more than a tiny kitchen and a bedroom, not even a private bathroom (that would be shared, and down two flights of stairs). But she’s worked to make it livable. It has a carpet and some curtains. It’s clean enough. And it has a bed.

It’ll do. 

They don’t talk much. Hardly at all. Within five minutes of arriving, Shido is sitting on his bed with his knees spread apart, the woman on her knees in front of him, working her tongue over his hard cock. 

She hums and grins at the sight of him. Clearly, she’s the definition of the word ‘loose.’ Shido counts himself lucky that he’s met a woman like this on his first night out. They’ll fuck a few times and that’ll be the end of it. No strings attached. She hasn’t given him her name and he hasn’t offered his own either. That’s not what this is and they both know it. 

This is merely a scratching of a mutual itch. Compulsory. Perfunctory. Almost professional. He sees the woman as more of a business partner than anything. He doesn’t want to know her after tonight. 

“You don’t disappoint, sir,” she says hungrily, stuffing the tip of his dick in her mouth. 

Shido smiles. 

He throws his head back and groans at the hot slide of his cock down her throat. She’s skilled. Unbearably so! Her mouth is tight around him, enveloping his full length without complaint. Her tongue works the underside of his cock with relish. She sucks him so well! 

Shido can’t remember the last time he had a blowjob. He never allowed Ninchi to take him in his mouth out of fear of those jagged fangs (reasonable, no?). So out of all the things he did with that fish, this was never one of them. It’s been too long! 

If he taught him, though, Ninchi would learn well. Ninchi does exactly as he’s told, no more, no less. Shido should have spent more time showing him how to do this. How to suck him off properly. Shido should have had more patience on the island…

He buries his hand in the woman’s sandy blonde hair. Bobbing her head up and down in time to his shallow thrusts. She lets him do even that.

“Good boy,” he rumbles, eyes slipping closed. That feels fantastic…

Humming some kind of wordless question, she squirms out of his hold. “You sure you got the right one?” she asks. Not smiling. “That don’t sound like me.” 

What? Why? What did he say? Shido can’t remember what he said to piss her off. In truth, he’s fairly shit-faced, so. 

But what the hell does it matter. 

“Come here,” he grumbles. Reaching for her body with greedy hands. 

Sighing, she stands and slides into his lap. Straddling him. Her smile returns quickly enough. Shido rips her clothes off without a hint of care. Tearing the laces of her corset and freeing those thunderous breasts. Finally! He buries his face in them and chomps weakly at the proffered flesh. So soft! So deliciously, gloriously soft! He avails himself of the splendor of her breasts quite thoroughly, and then pops one of her nipples in his mouth. 

She moans openly while he sucks her. 

Shido grins, rubbing his cock against her wet drawers down below. “Do you like that, baby?” 

“Ah yeah, that’s the ticket. Keep going---ah!” 

Of course she likes it. She’s putty in his hands. Sweet marzipan putty. With two solid legs on either side. Shido squeezes her thick thighs and moans as well. 

A human woman. Thank the gods.

He sticks his hand in her drawers and finds her wetness. She’s soaked for him! Shido’s fingers work against her heat, parting coarse hair to tease her folds. Sussing out the sensitive nub at the top of her cleft, thumbing it mercilessly while he bites her nipples. Her thighs clench around his waist and her hands dig into his shoulders. He hasn’t even taken off his uniform, and he honestly doesn’t plan to. She might not even want him to. They both know it’s a turn-on for her. 

Shido slips a finger inside of her and swirls it around, riling up her sensitive spots. He crooks his finger, as if beckoning the sweetest parts inside of her closer towards him. She bounces on his finger, fucking herself, and holds his head to her breasts. Her nails are long, but not sharp. Not claws.

Shido is so relieved. A normal woman! A cunt he can recognize! Hands without webbing and trembling thighs clutching him desperately! 

Normal. This is normal. This is what he wants. 

It really is.

He shoves another finger inside of her and fucks her in earnest, using the hard muscles in his forearm to give his thrusts more power. He flicks his thumb over and over her swollen nub, letting his nail scratch her there ever so slightly---

When she cums, she throws her head back and sings on a high, beautiful note. Bearing the expanse of her throat. Scale-less. Silky smooth. Gorgeous. The wrinkles on her face are not present on her neck or chest. That area must certainly be her greatest strength. Shido kisses her clavicle and swipes his tongue over the sweat on her skin. 

She tastes...human. 

Suddenly, Shido feels like he’s come to a dead end. A place where the heretofore smooth road has suddenly...disappeared. The way forward seems dark. 

He’s losing wood. 

Growling, Shido shoves his wet fingers in his mouth. Trying to entice himself with the intimate taste of her pussy. He recognizes this taste well! He’s enjoyed it his whole life. But now…

A hint of sadness lodges itself inside his stomach. It’s not right. Her juices are delicious, objectively, but...not the taste Shido has been craving after all. He wishes it were saltier. Thicker. More...animal. Blueberry stuffing, when framed on purple flesh---

What the fuck is wrong with him. He’s not like this! He’s not insane. He’s a normal human man and this shouldn’t be what he wants---

Thankfully, the woman doesn’t notice a thing. She scrambles to her feet, once she catches her breath after her first orgasm, and shoves off the rest of her clothes. Naked, she joins him on the bed and spreads her legs wide.

“Let’s have it, tiger,” she wooes. Running a hand up her inner thigh to spur him on. “I’ll take the full salute now, if you please.” 

Disgusted with himself, Shido pushes all those thoughts away and lays down on top of her. He’s not nearly as hard as he was a moment ago, but it’ll still work. Without waiting another second (afraid of the consequences that might have), Shido thrusts his cock inside her welcoming cunt. 

He moans brokenly once he’s in. This! This is---! 

“There you go,” the woman encourages. She wraps her legs around his waist and pushes him further in. “That’s what you needed, hm? Too many weeks at sea I’ll wager.” 

Shido buries his face in her neck. “You have no idea.” 

He fucks her hard. He doesn’t spare his thrusts, since it’s clear that the woman doesn’t need him. He uses his momentum to keep himself interested. Every time he opens his eyes and sees the truth of this woman’s bountiful body, Shido feels like he’s stabbing himself in the gut. It’s a distressing feeling, to say the least. He can’t keep his eyes open! If he does, this will all be over because Shido won’t be able to continue. 

In his mind, underneath the layers of heavy curtains and lies and denials, Shido’s connection to Ninchi throbs painfully. While his hips move rotely, he fights the urge to touch that tender spot in his mind. His skin is crawling. He’s so hungry, starving, and the only thing he wants is….

Once he touches that place, myriad memories burst through his mind. Footprints of past conversations and moving pictures of their shared moments. A guileless smile, bright as the sun. Salty, sun-baked flesh. Scaly arms reaching for him.

That boy…

_“Tits? Sweeeeeet titssss?”_

_“Name? Human? Are you, yes no?”_

_“I would like to see, too!”_

_“What else do you need? Can I bring it?”_

_“I love you, Captain. I’ll always be by your side. I promise I’ll never leave. Ever.”_

Shido holds this stranger in his arms, a human woman, and tries to pretend that she is someone (something) she isn’t. He wants her to be smaller, slighter, bonier. Boyish. Scaly like a snake. Salt-encrusted. Happy. 

_“Take me. I’m yours.”_

Ninchi is his. Shido knows that! They both do. His body was so perfect! Always open, always willing. Always smiling. Always happy with whatever Shido gave.

Shido wants him now. Even though he finally has a woman that’s all he ever wanted, Shido still wants Ninchi. Tears swim behind the veil of his eyes and Shido wishes---

“Ninchi…!” 

As he finds his release, Shido thinks of the cold, wet embrace of his boy. It’s the only thing that can get him there. Without it, Shido worries he might never have been able to cum. 

He doesn’t know if the woman heard him. That name he uttered when he climaxed, if she’d even recognize it as a name. Honestly, Shido doesn’t really care if she does or not. He got there. That’s the important thing. 

He fucks the barmaid a few more times. On her knees, like imagined. Even the beautiful sight of a red, slap-marked bottom isn’t enough to get Shido there in the end. He runs his fingers over her skin and thinks of scales. 

Those silver, dazzling scales. Ethereal. Perfect. 

A connection that cannot be broken.

In light of this, Shido doesn’t know how he’ll manage to stay sane.

________________________

Leviathan’s hands hover over Ninchi’s round, swollen stomach. She won’t touch him, (of course, they’re not animals!), but she must get close to inspect his belly. He’s six months pregnant already, and he hasn’t seen Captain since the day he got off the big ship. 

It’s been weeks.

Leviathan’s yellow, kohl-rimmed eyes blink. She clicks her tongue in the direction of Ninchi’s navel (an echoing sound that reverberates through the water) and the baby gives a responsive kick. 

She smiles. Yes, this baby is healthy and developing normally. 

The happy relief that bursts in Ninchi’s chest at this news is...hollow. Ninchi smiles and nods again and again. Thanking Leviathan from the bottom of his heart. She has been taking such good care of him over the past few weeks. Making sure Ninchi eats well enough for both him and the baby. Easing his questions about this process with her calm, reserved demeanor and her considerable experience. 

Keeping him company while Ninchi and his baby are utterly alone. 

And although yes, Ninchi is grateful towards her, he is also unbearably sad. His sadness hits him at times with a force that can crush him, body and soul. The person who should be caring for Ninchi during this time is….

Captain.

Why hasn’t the Captain returned? Where is he? Is he safe? Have the humans done something awful to him and that’s what’s keeping him away? Ninchi can sense that Shido is still alive, his body would know if he died. But that doesn’t mean he’s safe! He could be held prisoner somewhere or...something…

Unless he…

A blank look of horror so unthinkable it has no name, no expression, no picture, settles over his face. He swims to the far side of Leviathan’s cave and curls in on himself. Rubbing his stomach delicately. 

_“Hungry…”_

The baby is hungry. It’s not talking in words yet, but Ninchi can feel its thoughts and feelings through their connection. The cord that runs through their bodies, binding them together. It’s a physical connection, not just a mental one. Therefore it’s much stronger than anything Ninchi has experienced before. 

He stuffs some seaweed in his mouth and swallows it. Hoping the kelp will satisfy the baby for now. He doesn’t have the strength to go hunting when he feels like this. 

Pretty soon, though, the baby will need meat. Leviathan has brought bounties of fish, but Ninchi knows that he should hunt on his own too. Show the baby how it’s done. 

He will. 

He will do everything. He will make sure this baby wants for nothing.

Especially if…

Ninchi doesn’t give voice to those thoughts. Never. He doesn’t allow himself to. He won’t ever doubt Captain. He promised never to do it, and he meant what he said. 

Captain will return. 

Captain will love him. He will love this baby. 

He will. 

Of course he will! 

It’s just taking more time than Ninchi thought. Because of human matters, probably. Nothing serious. 

_“Captain will love you,”_ Ninchi tells the baby. _“Your papa will love you more than you can ever know. He definitely will.”_

He definitely will. Without any doubt. 

He will. 

__________________________

“So I discovered that all men have a reasonable side, at the business end of a pistol at least!” 

The men around the table burst out laughing. Shido remains silent. He refills his glass with some of Okumura’s house whiskey and tries to drown the bitterness inside of him with even more bitterness.

“What a rousing journey, Kobayakawa-san,” a man says. One of the city’s top legislators. “Glad you turned up successful in the end.” 

“It was nothing,” Kobayakawa proclaims. “Perhaps I had luck on my side.” 

He makes pointed eye contact with Shido when he says this, rubbing one hand over his chin. On his stubby pinky finger, there’s a heavy ring with a fat amethyst square in the center. Garish and gaudy. Kobayakawa’s family crest is engraved underneath the stone, a mild point of pride for a reasonable person (his family bears a distant relation to the king’s uncle or something), and a precious treasure to Kobayakawa. He never takes that ring off. Most of the time, he enjoys flashing it in people’s faces. Same as he’s doing to Shido right now. 

An uncomfortable silence settles over the table. 

Shido still says nothing. He turns back to his glass. 

“Well, don’t let me hog the spotlight!” Kobayakawa lays a tiny hand on his expansive chest. Purple gem sparkling in the light of the dining room. “Shido-sama, tell us. How did you survive that shipwreck? I heard they couldn’t even find pieces of The Ark afterwards. Nor any unfortunate cadavers left to give the grieving widows.” 

Several men cross themselves or mutter hasty prayers of respect. Shido does neither. 

“So how is it possible, Shido-sama,” Kobayakwa continues. Bulging eyes boring down upon Shido with distant hatred. “That you survived with hardly a scratch?” 

Okumura, sitting at the head of the table, clears his throat. “Would anyone like another drink? I have a 1607 Chablis in my cellar---”

“I got scratched alright.” Shido’s voice is loud enough for every single person at this horrible, contrived dinner to hear him. “Nearly lost my leg. My kneecap fell clear out. Bone rubbed raw by the sand. You may have noticed I walk with a limp now. That’s the reason.” 

He can’t look at Kobayakawa when he speaks. He can’t risk looking at that disgusting, infantile man and trust himself not to kill him with his bare hands. Shido accepted Okumura’s invitation to this godforsaken dinner at the governor’s house only because he thought there might be a chance that Kobayakawa would relinquish his position back to Shido gracefully. Out of respect. Or that Okumura would announce afterward that Shido would be resuming his old post due to some law that’s hardly known. Possibly out of appreciation for everything Shido’s done for him over the years, or maybe out of fear (since Shido has more dirt on Okumura than anyone living). 

But so far, they’ve done nothing of the sort. Neither of them. Okumura has spent the dinner filling everyone’s glasses and shaking hands. Kobayakawa can’t stop talking about his dealing with Jack Knife (in which he ambushed him and threatened him to give up the gold at gunpoint, a severely sorry mistake, since Jack Knife will no doubt find a way to turn the tables on him, whether tomorrow or ten years from now. That pirate has a long memory and untouchable pride). 

It’s unbearable. Shido’s head hurts. He wants to go back to the room he’s renting, far away from his naval lodgings near the docks. He refuses to step even a block outside the city’s center. He gave up fucking nameless women some weeks ago, unable to rouse his enthusiasm. So these days he mostly drowns himself in liquor and thinks himself in circles.

His plans are weak. At best.

Now, Kobayakawa is sitting across a table from him. As jolly as Santa Claus in his naval uniform with the yellow sash (a symbol of twenty years of service). Touting all his successes, rubbing them in Shido’s face.

Asking questions he has no right to ask. Seeking answers that no one else on the planet has deigned to seek. 

Kobayakawa frowns in disgust at Shido’s descriptions of his injuries. He quickly covers the look with heavily forced sympathy. “How awful, Shido-sama. How fortuitous that you managed to heal yourself! May we all count ourselves blessed to have you back in service of the king.” He touches a finger to his chin in thought. “Which...how did you manage to get back, again?”

The mood around the table has turned awkward. Harrowing tales of hand to mouth survival, mixed with the palpable animosity is just…

Not dinner conversation.

“Okumura,” another man says loudly. Cutting the tension with an inarticulate swipe. “Did you say a 1607 Chablis? My god, man! How have you managed to store it properly all these years!” 

“Hmph. You know the state of my cellars. Exquisite, is the word.” Okumura is happy to steer the conversation down smoother paths. 

Shido stays clear of any conversation until the bitter end of the evening. Okumura invited Shido to take a walk through his private gardens together. This must be the part where they discuss the future of Shido’s position. 

They smoke cigars and stand in the rose bushes together. Not so much businessmen as they are star-crossed lovers. It’s humiliating. Shido hates himself for being here. Forced to cling to Okumura’s coattails, begging for any scrap of a naval career moving forward---

“The news is mixed, I won’t lie to you, Shido.” Okumura smokes wistfully and stares at the roses. 

Shido eyes the burning tip of his cigar. He saw this coming. He doesn’t want it to be sugar coated. He just wants to know what he needs to do. His next steps. 

“I have a position for you, though. That’s the bottom line. But…” Okumura’s breath dissolves into smoke. “...it’s not a captain position. I’ll tell you that first.” 

Shido sighs. He lets the cigar burn. 

He knew it. 

“What’s the position.” He has to know. Even if the next words shred what little pride he has left. 

Okumura crosses his legs at the knee. “Kamoshida’s second mate just got promoted to first mate. He was thinking of promoting his lieutenant, but...I sent a little bird his way and now he’s thinking differently. Wants to hire out. I told him I have a first rate seaman who’s looking for work…” 

The shame. It guts Shido like a fish hook. Kamoshida is the lowest of the low when it comes to captains. His command is based on fear and abject sycophantry, nothing any self-respecting naval man should ascribe to. He also allows women on board just because he’s too lusty to go without for a few months. That’s bad luck, and painfully embarrassing. 

Shido can’t stand the guy. 

“So. A second mate position on an idiot’s venereal-disease-infested rat ship. After all the years I served under you, keeping your wallet full and your name clean, that’s the best you can give me?” 

Okumura shrugs indifferently. “I’m not a miracle worker. Your position has been filled; Kobayakawa came back successful. Not to mention, your last vessel met a grisly end. Wrecking a royal ship craft? That’s grounds for dishonorable discharge, you know that.” 

On paper, yes. But that rule still applied? To Shido?

“You’re lucky I was able to get you anything at all,” Okumura continues. Extinguishing his cigar in the ashtray near the bushes. “If it weren’t for me, you’d be swabbing decks on a private fishing rig to pay your bills. At least the Kamoshida job keeps your pension intact.” 

Sighing, putting an end to the conversation, Okumura rises to his feet. “I’ll give you a full day to think it over. Come to my office first thing on Friday morning if you’ll accept the second mate position. Kamoshida’s ship makes sail early on Saturday. So make your decision quickly.” 

Without exchanging pleasantries, Okumura walked back in his house. Leaving Shido alone in the rose bushes. 

How did it come to this. 

One storm. That’s all it was. Just a storm that Shido misjudged from the look of the clouds. He sailed right into it and cost his crew their lives and himself his career. His ship, gone. His soul, tethered to some ancient, dull-eyed fish. 

That one storm took everything from Shido. In the blink of an eye. 

Even if he had judged the clouds properly, would there have been a way he could have avoided it? Perhaps not! So then, was this just his fate? Are all humans so precariously poised in the world? A few clouds away from total shame and ruination? 

Shido lays his head in his hands for a few moments. Eventually, pulling his pride from the soles of his feet, he gets up. Walks back to the house on legs he can not feel.

As soon as he exits the garden, he bumps into a yellowish wall of flesh. Which turns out to be a person, who turns out to be Kobayakawa. 

The last man in the world Shido wants to see.

“Shido-sama, where have you been?” the toad asks saccharinely. “The governor returned to dinner a while ago. We were wondering what happened to you.” 

Shido has no interest in this pissing contest anymore. This game. He’s already lost, hasn’t he? He lost to a man like this...what’s the point. 

“Get out of my way.” Shido shoulder-checks Kobayakawa on his way to the gate. He won’t head back in the dining room. He won’t make his polite goodbyes. He just needs to go back to his lodgings and have a nice, stiff drink. Obliteration feels like a natural response right now…

With one hand on the gate, Shido feels something small and hard pressed to the middle of his back. 

It’s unmistakable. Shido freezes on instinct.

“Say a word, and I’ll shoot. Get your hands where I can see them.” 

This. Now this? A final humiliation! Being held at gunpoint by Kobayakawa! 

This must be karma for the wicked deeds Shido has perpetrated in the past. He raises his hands in sad defeat.

Stubby fingers steal the pistol out of Shido’s holster. Now he’s defenseless.

“Start walking,” Kobayakawa barks. “To the docks.” 

Shido rolls his eyes. Why the docks? What kind of half-baked, nonsensical plan is this? From the same mind that thought it was a good idea to win Jack Knife over with a show of strength. Is Kobayakawa drunk on the power of his pistol now? Pathetic.

What’s even more pathetic, Shido does as he’s told. He has little choice. He doesn’t think Kobayakawa would shoot him here, but then again...with these beady-eyed cowards, who can say what he’ll do? He has politics on his side. Shido is sure Kobayakawa could string a tale of self-defense if he needed to kill Shido here. 

So he marches to the docks. Kobayakawa keeps his gun digging into Shido’s side, one hand on his shoulder so it looks like they’re bosom pals enjoying a stroll. Shido has so many wretched things he wants to say, but he doesn’t. He truly doesn’t have the energy to address Kobayakawa at all. The severe shame of this situation makes him feel like less of a man. He’d almost rather die than endure one more minute of this affair….

When he hears the telltale sound of water lapping against wooden planks, Shido realizes where he is. 

He’s been avoiding coming here for a reason. Now, the boy can sense him. 

Is he…?

Shido’s mind turns. Wheels clicking into place.

“To the end. Hurry the hell up!” Kobayakawa pushes Shido weakly. But, for one reason or another, Shido complies. 

Slowly, he starts pulling curtains off the connection in the core of his mind. Unearthing it. Bit by bit. 

They walk up the planks of a dock with no ship harbored. They’re both surrounded by water on all sides. Kobayakawa makes Shido walk to the very edge. 

Staring into the detritus-ridden water of a suddenly very likely future, Shido says at last, “You don’t have to do this, Kobayakawa. My job is already yours. Okumura already told me he won’t give me back the captainship. You’ve won, don’t you know that?”

“Won what?” Kobayakawa sneers and cocks his pistol. Aiming for Shido’s heart. “The chance to walk in your shadow for the rest of my life? What kind of captainship is that?” 

With his connection fully unveiled, Shido sends his thoughts flying as far as he possibly can. It’s been a few months since he tried this, so he’s a little rusty…

“I waited fifteen years for a captain position! You waltzed right in after your first ten years as a lieutenant! Unheard of!” Kobayakawa’s hand shakes with disgust. Has he really hated Shido that long? “I’ve been compared to you my whole career...and now, finally, I have what you had. Your job. Your credentials, savory and not. Then tonight, over dinner…” Kobayakawa sneers in total fury. “Those small-minded fools couldn’t stop regaling me with tales of your many successes! Reminiscing like old times!” 

Kobayakawa shakes his head again and again. “For the life of me, Shido, I don’t know what they see in you. You’re a silver-tongued snake with a strong right hook. That’s all you are.” 

The truth of the matter is that Shido doesn’t care about Kobayakawa’s motivations. He’s an idiot, and he has a pistol trained on Shido’s chest. So. That’s all he cares about. Shido scans the water for any flash of silver or red. Searching…

“I need a clean break from you, Shido-san. As long as you still breathe, people will hold you and your supposed greatness over my head. I can’t allow the shame of that.” Kobayakawa raises his pistol higher. Aiming for Shido’s face. “Don’t worry, I’ll make sure they find your body. The sad suicide of a disgraced captain. It will be in the papers, rest assured. Everyone will know how you gave up in the end. Unable to bear your fall from grace. Succumbing to despair like a degenerate from the backalleys.” 

_“....Captain….?”_

It’s faint, but it’s there! 

A key clicks a lock into place within Shido’s mind. Pins turning, metal scraping into perfect alignment. At last, this companionship. This boy. This shared mind. Their connection. 

At last. Shidos’ soul heaves a contented sigh. His boy is here. 

How he’s missed him. 

Him and his ability to be perpetually useful.

_“Ninchi!”_

“And that’s what you are, Shido! A lowborn piece of dirt! You’re the son of some pisspoor fisherman no one’s ever heard of, and I’m a relative of the king! It’s revolting how you could think yourself higher than most, with your questionable ancestry. I’ve always hated that about you....” 

Luckily, Kobayakawa loves the sound of his own voice. He can monologue like the best of them, can’t he. That works well for Shido, who is still trying to focus on his connection. 

_“Captain! I hear you! Where are you?”_

_“Here.”_

_“I see you! I see! I’m coming.”_

Sure enough, Shido catches sight of glittering scales approaching from the distance. His boy is coming! Right on time. As always.

Shido’s heart races. They don’t have many chances to get this right! If Ninchi is discovered prematurely, Kobayakawa might shoot them both! 

He must keep Kobayakawa’s attention on him. “I never knew you hated me so much,” Shido offers. Trying to be conversational. The guy wants to talk, right? “Seems like a waste. You could have just learned your place and served under me instead. Put your life to good use.”

Kobayakawa’s eyes nearly pop out of his head. “D-don’t speak to me like that! Serve under you, I would never! You’d be lucky to serve under me! And I’d make you swab the decks like a common houseboy until your hands bled...I’d…”

_“Captain, are you alright? Your heart is fast. Who’s this man?”_

_“I’m not alright, Ninchi. I’m in danger. This man wants to kill me.”_

A hot flash of pure hatred skims the surface of Shido’s mind. Ninchi hates the idea of that! His rage and vehemence seeps into Shido as well, it’s overflowing. 

_“Captain. Let me take care of this. Should I?”_

Shido’s heart sings in gratitude. In victory. _“Yes.”_

“Enough talking.” Kobayakawa levels his pistol once more. “You should have stayed dead---”

No sooner are the words out of his mouth, then Kobayakawa turns to stone in fear. A pair of clawed, webbed hands appears around his waist. Brown hair and black eyes (lifeless as a shark’s, steeped in bloodlust), and teeth---rows and rows of teeth. 

Blood gushes from Kobayakawa’s back as Ninchi sinks his teeth into him. The man screams in pain, but the scream doesn’t last for long, because Ninchi drags him underwater without time for him to properly air his woes. The recently promoted captain disappears under the water’s surface. Gone forever. Nothing but his ripped, bloodied yellow sash and a dark line of human gore in his wake. 

Shido rushes to the edge of the dock. He kneels and waits for Ninchi to resurface. Through their connection, all Shido can hear is:

_“Tasty.”_

An improbable laugh bubbles to Shido’s lips. He chuckles, then he guffaws. 

Well. At least Kobayakawa---an utter pain in the ass to his last breath---was good for one thing! Feeding Ninchi. The boy must have been hungry. He feeds for a while, before gliding back up to the surface.

His pale, scaly face (soiled with blood around the corners of his mouth, caked on despite the water) appears and rises to meet Shido. Like a dream. Like an angel covered in the blood of Shido’s enemies. 

So, so miraculously perfect. 

“Captain---”

Shido grabs Ninchi’s hands. Ignoring the bits of flesh stuck to his claws, Shido kisses his webbed fingers. “My boy. You’ve done so well. Is he dead?” 

“Yes, definitely.” Ninchi smiles happily. “I fed well! I’m actually full after eating only half of that evil man. He made a good meal! With leftovers. So we will eat well the next few days. Me...and him.” 

Shido’s heart nearly breaks when he sees Ninchi’s innocent, happy grin. As intoxicating and restorative as it was on the island! He cups Ninchi’s adorable face and rubs his thumb over the scales on his cheek. Just the way that mermaid boy likes. 

But, Shido doesn’t understand. Who is Ninchi talking about? “Him?” he asks, distantly confused. 

“Mm.” Ninchi rises further out of the water. Exposing more of his body. His boyish chest, his stomach---

His stomach. It’s so bloated! Round and full, almost like he’s….! 

It...can’t be! 

Shido’s jaw drops. He clutches Ninchi’s hands tighter, crazy with the urge to drag Ninchi onto the shore. To carry him (impossibly heavy as he is) to safety. To keep him away. Away, away. Somewhere Ninchi can be safe. Where Shido can get a good look at this stomach and decide for himself what he sees.

But in his heart he already knows. 

This is real. 

A foreign, terrifying feeling rises within Shido’s throat. “Ninchi…” he chokes. “Are you…?” 

The boy nods. “Yes. Seven months.” He strokes his stomach proudly. “I wanted to tell you. I tried to tell you, but you were so busy on the ship and then you were busy in the city with your human things. I wanted to sing to call you, but I promised I wouldn’t, so---”

Before he can say anything else, Shido grabs Ninchi’s shoulders and pulls him into a kiss. He kisses him in spite of the blood on his face and the daggers in his mouth. He kisses Ninchi as hard as he can, the errant parts of his soul that have been yearning for this boy (his other, his one true pair, his bonded mate) fly in all directions. 

Shido loves him so much. So much that it hurts. Seeing that stomach, thinking of the life that is somehow growing inside of him...because of Shido…

“Who goes there? Show yourself!” 

Footsteps and gas lamps approach from down the dock. They haven’t been found yet, but people have gotten wise to their commotion. 

“Let’s not do this here,” Shido rushes to say. “Follow me in the water. I know a better place.” 

Ninchi nods and disappears from sight. 

Narrowly escaping the stevedores, Shido runs to the far side of the city. A forgotten corner. A place he’s used in the past---the place where he killed for the first time. His best friend in the naval academy, who had betrayed Shido to get a coveted spot on a royal ship. Shido has gone here to kill and to fuck, and to do all matter of deeds where the authorities’ eyes don’t reach. It’s a tiny plot of beach on the side of a rocky bluff. 

Here, they won’t be bothered. 

“Ninchi.” Shido stands at the water’s edge and waits. “Come to me. It’s safe now.” 

When his boy reappears, Shido can’t hold himself back anymore. He drags Ninchi ashore and holds him in his arms. Kissing the scales on his face, trailing his hand down his chest. He stops only briefly to flick those lewd, forever-exposed nipples (which makes Ninchi cry out, are they more sensitive now? Fascinating..). Then he carefully palms the bulge in Ninchi’s stomach. Heavy with a tiny creature growing underneath the skin. 

Shido is in awe. He can’t stop touching Ninchi’s stomach. He never wants to stop! This is incredible! How is it possible? Well, Ninchi always had both sets of genitals, didn’t he? Are merfolk so hermaphroditic that even men may bear children? 

Apparently. 

“Are you pleased, Captain?” Ninchi asks, touching Shido’s face hesitantly. 

“Yes. Exceedingly.” Shido kisses Ninchi’s forehead. Never taking his hand away for a second. “You’ve done so well, my boy. Taking care of this baby on your own for so long…” 

“I had help.” Ninchi preens under the praise. “I made a friend.” 

“A friend?” The possessive side of Shido rears its ugly head. 

“Yes. A mermaid who used to be in my clan. She pair-bonded with a human, too. She’s helping me prepare for our baby to be born.” Ninchi eyes sparkle. “Her name is Leviathan, although humans call her ‘Sae.’ I wish you could meet her, but she’s very private. She likes being alone.” 

Shido slowly nods. More mermaids in the seas near Royal City. Who would have thought. “I see.” 

“Captain…” A tremor works its way through Ninchi. He purrs in that clacking, screeching way he has. He buries his face against Shido’s free hand. “I missed you so much.” 

Shido sighs. He presses his forehead to Ninchi’s. “I missed you too.” 

….

Perhaps, it’s time to admit the truth.

Whatever Ninchi did the first time they had sex (even before that? When he was courting him with music, gifts, food, and shelter?), whatever bond he created, he tied Shido to him. Inextricably. By the heart. By the soul! Shido can no longer live without this mermaid boy. He fought this truth for months, living with the pain of being separated, trying to forget his feelings by sleeping with random women and drinking. But nothing he did could ever erase the undeniable truth.

Their soul bond is a two-way street. Shido is tethered to Ninchi as tightly as Ninchi is to him. 

They are two. 

“Please, Captain…” Ninchi’s eyes are watery. Is he about to cry? “If you must go outside the limits of our bond again, I understand. You’re important and you have things to do in the city. But…” 

A tiny, pearly white tear escapes Ninchi’s eyes. “Don’t leave us alone too long, okay? We missed you too much. I never doubted you’d return, but, sometimes it was hard to...move around...and eat...without you everything gets...slower...” 

Shido shakes his head as hard as he can. “Never. I’ll never leave you again, Ninchi. I promise. I’ve….” Shido is so utterly ashamed of his behavior! How could he leave his pregnant boy like this! Gallivanting off into the night! Such blackguard behavior! “I’ve been a fool. Forgive me.” 

(Casually, where Ninchi can’t perceive, Shido throws curtains over his memories of sleeping with other women. No reason Ninchi needs to know about any of that. No reason at all. Some secrets, Shido will have to take to his grave!) 

“There’s nothing to forgive, Captain. We are mates. There aren’t any bad feelings left when the bond happens.” 

(He says that, but...probably best to leave the other women out of all this. Just in case.) 

“Well, good.” Shido kisses every inch of Ninchi’s face. “Because I aim to make you feel like the most spoiled boy in Royal City for the next two months. Until your baby arrives. And then, we’ll dote on it the same way.”

They share a smile, and Shido remembers something. “You said...it’s a boy?” 

Ninchi nods. Grinning. “Yes. He is.” 

“How do you know, though?” 

“I can hear him. We talk sometimes. He’s very small and his needs are simple. But I love his little voice so much. You’re going to love him, too. Want to listen?” 

Shido blinks. This is unholy. Unnatural. How is it even allowed? 

But then again. He knocked up a mermaid boy with a cunt as sweet as the dawn, and now they can listen inside each other’s heads. So, in a way, it checks out. 

“Yes. I do.” Shido nods. Of his own free will, he holds his hand out to Ninchi. 

All the pearly tears have been chased away. Now Ninchi beams and presses Shido’s hand to his stomach. 

It’s like hearing a conversation going on behind closed doors. Muffled, but distinct enough to make out definite words and the presence of two different people. 

_“Little one, come say hello to your papa. He wants to meet you, too.”_

_“....”_

_“Don’t be shy, now. Papa loves you.”_

_“...Papa?”_

As if zapped by lightning, Shido yanks his hand away and gasps for air. “Sweet mother of….Christ!” 

That was a baby! A living baby! With a mind and a voice and a heart….! Holy shit. Holy _shit_ , this is real! As if the voice wasn’t enough, the baby kicked Shido’s hand as soon as it spoke. Solidifying its presence in the world. 

“Aren’t you proud of him, Captain?” Ninchi smiles with a mouth of jagged teeth. “I think he’s ambitious like you. He can’t wait to be born.” 

Shido can barely breathe. That was one of the most powerful moments in his life. Feeling a baby’s kick, hearing its voice...not just a baby, but _his_ baby! For a second, with their consciences connected, Shido felt as if the baby were inside of _him_ as well, the same way it’s inside Ninchi…!

Horrifying. And so full of wonder. 

Shido swallows and takes a deep breath. “He’s certainly strong,” he admits. 

Now he’s felt that, there can be no going back. 

His path is set. Shido knows exactly what he must do with every moment for the rest of his life. He can see it all. Step by painstaking step.

“Ninchi,” Shido begins, patting that stomach to hopefully lull the child back to sleep. “That man you killed for me, he had something purple and shiny on his finger. Can you get it for me?”

“His shiny thing? Sure!” With some difficulty (considering his sudden increase in girth), Ninchi rolls into the sea to retrieve the ring. 

Shido looks around the hidden cove. He wishes he could live here, but. It’s not the best place for a home. He must start looking for seaside cottages in earnest. Yes, for sure. 

There’s so much he needs to do before the baby is born.

_____________________________

Friday morning finds Shido in Okumura’s office after all. The man is in a tizzy. Phones are ringing and several newspapers lay scattered around his desk. 

“This damn Kobayakawa!” Okumura pounds his fist on the table. “Disappearing into the night! Where has he gone? Don’t tell me he had a heart attack and died somewhere…that bastard…” 

“Trouble in paradise?” Shido muses, crossing his arms and meeting Okumura’s stare with indifference.

At that look, the governor pauses. He knows that look. He knows Shido. He knows him too damn well! 

“Don’t tell me.” Okumura lowers his voice. “Don’t tell me you know anything about Kobayakawa’s disappearance.”

Shido shrugs and shakes his head. “Not particularly, no.” 

As he says that, he reaches into his coat pocket and retrieves a ring. It’s heavy, with a purple amethyst in the center. Wordlessly, Shido lays the ring on the governor’s desk.

A pallor passes over Okumura. He turns green, then white, then green again. 

He sinks into his chair with a heavy thunk. 

“So, it should go without saying, I’ll resume my captain’s post on Monday.” Shido is making unhurried, unflinching eye contact with Okumura. 

At a complete loss, Okumura runs a hand over his mouth. He swallows hard. Finally, he says, “Yes. That’s right. Monday morning.” 

Shido stands. “Very good. Thank you for your time, your lordship.” 

With a curt salute, he sees himself out. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Me, coming up with the ideas for this fic: I just want Ninchi to be a mer(der)maid. 
> 
> Our boy is a proper murdermaid and I'm living.


	4. Fortune Favors the Bold

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Him and Captain and all who come after. Ninchi will always be there."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Audenes Fortuna iuvat" = "Fortune favors the bold" in Latin. 
> 
> Also, this was a story about fish porn once. 
> 
> Short epilogue that wraps up the loose ends!

**Epilogue: Fortune Favors the Bold**

The waves lap gently against the shore. Along the horizon, a pink sun is just beginning to rise. The sand is cold. It’s autumn’s end, the beginning of winter. A brisk morning and a frigid, unhurried sea. 

These are the things that greet the birth of Shido’s first son. 

He’s been sitting here the whole night. Ninchi was laying in his arms on this very shore, heavy with child, his stomach near to bursting. Shido was stroking his head and telling him the story of the Roman god Saturn. Regaling him with tales of the planets he’s so fascinated by. Then all of a sudden Ninchi convulsed in pain. His body trembled from the tips of his fin to his shoulders, his slit open. 

“It’s time, Captain,” Ninchi told him. His voice was confident, but his eyes were wide and exhilarated. Fearful, Shido would say, if he knew what it looked like when Ninchi was afraid.

“Alright, then,” Shido answered, squeezing his boy’s clawed hands tightly. “Be careful.” 

Ninchi nodded and swam off. That was it. He was in a hurry to get to the grotto of his mermaid friend. The one who will be helping him through this delivery. The woman Shido has still never met and probably won’t. 

Oh, he wishes he could be there with him! 

...On one hand. On the other hand, he has to imagine it will be a fairly stomach-turning sight. Live birth. He doesn’t pity the loss of such a sight, really. If anything, he’d like to be there to make sure Ninchi is safe. There’s not much Shido could do medically speaking to assist. But he would see to it that Ninchi is protected from any predators that might smell blood in the water…

Regardless, it’s impossible. The water is too cold and too deep. Shido would either drown or freeze to death if Ninchi were to carry him into the depths of that mermaid’s grotto. 

So he must wait here. Alone with the sand and the sky and a few ratty gulls. A beach not dissimilar to the one he lived on for six months, under Ninchi’s care. But this one is bigger. Not so isolated. Behind him are rows of trees that, if you follow the single road down the middle, you will come to Royal City in just under an hour on foot. Less by carriage. There’s life outside of this beach, even if you have to journey some way. 

This is where Shido decided to build his home. Well, his second home. His first home is his captain’s quarters near the Municipal House, in the heart of the city. Respectable (though austere) lodgings that Shido has lived in for decades. Most high-ranking military men have a house or two outside the city, though. For Shido, this will be his first. 

A home. A house. A cottage by the sea. He has already commissioned construction. The bones of the house are visible further inland. As close to the water as Shido was allowed to build. Close enough that he can carry his wife to bed some nights and Ninchi can swim back to the sea when he needs to. (Shido never thought he’d look forward to such a thing: A proper marital bed. What a concept. But, life is like that. A single line of clouds can change a man’s fate. So.) 

The house isn’t ready yet, but it will be. Soon. 

Shido lays his palm against the sand. It’s been hours. Does it always take this long? Is Ninchi alright? He tests the rope of their ethereal connection and receives mostly silence. Soft, fuzzy. There’s also a distant, pulsating pain that Shido barely feels. Like a clenching of muscles in anticipation of some greater blow, the brace before a long fall. He doesn’t know what that means, but he’s taking it as assurance that Ninchi is at least still alive. 

Childbirth is treacherous. Everyone knows that. His boy, his poor, precious mermaid boy…

His boy is strong. More shark than fish. He’ll be fine. 

And the child...the son that Shido has heard on more than one occasion…

What kind of child will it be? Although Shido was out of his mind with pride and excitement when he saw Ninchi’s swollen stomach, cooler logic returned after some time. This is a half fish, half human...creature, isn’t it? Will it even resemble a human? Will it be more sea monster than man? Will it have bulging fish eyes and fins for hands, fangs where there should be teeth? Or will it be a human, one who drowns underwater as Shido might have…

He knows what Ninchi told him, what Leviathan said would happen. But still. Shido can’t be sure until he sees it with his own eyes. 

The sun has risen. It’s morning. Crisp December. Shido wraps his peacoat tighter around himself and tucks his knees to his chest. He packs a pipe with some fresh tobacco and smokes. 

The future feels fragile. Everything hinged on the well-being of some fishboy in the deep blue sea. Fortunately, the sea has been good to Shido lately. Although it is still as fickle as a hen.

What will the sea bring him today? 

At mid-morning, he hears him: _“Captain. He’s beautiful.”_

Shido hurries to his feet. _“Is it done? Are you alright? Where are you?”_

_“It’s done. Your son is agile and curious. He’s swimming alongside me, so strong and bright-eyed. We’re coming to meet you. Can you see him?”_

Shido closes his eyes and concentrates. He wants to see his son...his mermaid wife and his son---

There, in his mind, he can see a flashing image. A tiny mermaid child, no bigger than toddler. His scales are dark brown, mahogany with some reddish tones, and his fins are bright orange. His bottom half is a fish and his top is a young boy...a mermaid. Assuredly so. 

Shido breathes a sigh of relief. The child is normal. It has a recognizable shape and a thin patch of brown hair on its head. Not a monster. 

He collapses back onto a sitting position on the shore, overwhelmed. They’re healthy. They’re alive. They’re coming to him---

Before Shido can catch his breath, Ninchi pops out of the water with a look of expectant happiness. There are dark circles under his eyes and his face is paler than usual, gaunt. He’s suffered. But, in his arms is a squirming fish child. Blinking at the dawn. 

As curious as its mother, it seems.

Grinning, Shido holds out his hands. He means to pull Ninchi to shore so he can inspect him for injuries, but instead Ninchi plops the child right into his hands. Unannounced. Shido rears back automatically. He’s shocked at his ability to hold a baby steady! He’s never held an infant before, nonetheless a mercreature…! 

The boy wiggles in Shido’s hands. Its tail twitches helplessly in the air. 

“Hold him closer, Captain,” Ninchi prompts, crawling up to meet them. “He might be cold.” 

Right. Blinking, mind working sluggishly, Shido opens his coat and tucks the mermaid child against his chest. He wraps his coat around it, shivering against the chill of the child’s wet body, but hoping his own body heat will keep it comfortable. 

‘On land, it is one thing. In the sea, it’s another.’ That’s what Ninchi said. So that means…

Shido pets the child’s soft brown hair. It coos happily and turns towards his chest. It seems to like his warmth. Its top half feels so delicate, and the bottom half...although Shido can feel the strong muscles in its fishtail, it's still so small! The hands are so tiny! They wave in the air, opening and closing, searching for contact. 

Without thinking, Shido puts his finger inside the child’s waiting fist (his forefinger is almost too big for it to hold). It grabs him tight and, not hesitating for even a second, brings Shido’s finger to its mouth. 

“Easy…” He doesn’t know why he’s trying to reason with it. But it’s the first thing that comes out of his mouth. 

The child sucks Shido’s finger with abandon. It has blunt nubs at the front of its mouth where teeth are developing. Not fangs, from the feel of them. Teeth. Shido curls his finger in to the knuckle, appreciative of his son’s strong suck. 

His son. 

His eyes wander back to Ninchi. Indeed, Ninchi looks sallow. Shido runs a hand across his face and says, “My dear boy, you’ve done so well. So very, very well. Look at the strong child you’ve given us.”

A tired, happy smile graces Ninchi’s face. Some life returns to him at those words. “Thank you, Captain. I worked really hard, but it was worth it. This baby is all I’ve ever wanted.” 

He grins, resting his head on Shido’s shoulders. “I wanted to see you became a father. Ever since you told me about ‘mother and father.’ I wanted you to be father and me to be mother. A family.” 

Really? Shido bounces his eyebrows, shifting the baby’s weight to one hand and tugging his finger free. Did Ninchi want that this whole time?

Silly. It took Shido this long to realize. 

He strokes his thumb over the scales on Ninchi’s face. “Well, you got it. We’re a family now.” He kisses Ninchi’s clammy forehead. “And I won’t let anything happen to you or him.”

Ninchi purrs in happiness. “Good. It’s the same for me. I’ll do my best to make sure you’re protected. Safe. Forever.” 

Now the memory of Kobayakawa’s last scream comes to mind. The blood. The pieces of him that rose to the surface after Ninchi devoured him. That ring, sucked clean of bones and flesh. 

Shido grins under his mustache. Wider and more arrogant than he normally dares. 

The taste of this victory is sweeter than he could ever have imagined. 

“Have you thought of a name?” he asks Ninchi, after some time reveling in the splendor of the moment. 

“Mm.” Ninchi nods. “I was thinking Noah, like the man in the story about your ship. The Ark.” 

A bolt of pure ego and unrivaled appreciation strikes Shido in the chest. This boy is...this boy. He closes his eyes and nods over and over. “Yes. That’s perfect.” 

The two of them stare at Noah for a while longer. Under their eyes, when Noah’s body dries off, his scales and fins disappear. Two legs appear in their place. Chunky little baby legs, wiggling in the air. A set of genitals that seems human. Everything in its place. 

‘On land, it is one thing.’ This. A normal human. 

‘In the sea, it’s another.’ A mermaid. Beautiful, untethered, and natural. 

Perfect. Simply perfect in every way. 

____________________________

A baby is so hungry! Ninchi laughs and sits on the shore near the house Captain has built for him. This is where it’s safe for them. No humans ever come here, except for Captain. This is where Ninchi and Noah can come out of the water to spend time on land.

Noah can run around and play. Ninchi can watch him, feed him. Noah still feeds from Ninchi’s body; when he was born, he would eat the algae off Ninchi’s scales as fish do, but as he got bigger he got hungrier. Ninchi’s chest began to produce a rich white substance Captain calls ‘milk.’ So Noah drinks that now, almost exclusively. The milk is thick and full of nutrients. Ninchi knows his child will grow strong drinking this, and he loves feeding him. The pain he felt in the beginning---just like the pain he felt giving birth---is inconsequential! Ninchi isn’t deterred by pain. Not in the face of everything he’s ever wanted! He quickly discards the memory of this pain like picking the bones out of a fish. 

Pretty soon, Noah will be big enough to eat meat. When the time comes, Ninchi will show him how to hunt. Captain said he wants the boy to learn how to sit at a table, too. Like a human. Eat with tools, sharp pointy things that stab. Drink from a glass. Ninchi was confused at first, but then he realized…

Captain wants to bring their son into human society. 

Of course he does. He’s a proud father! He wants his son to be acknowledged, to become successful and important like himself! He wants the world to know him…

Ninchi’s heart swells to bursting when he thinks of this. Of Captain’s pride. Of the future. 

He looks down at his hand. On his left hand, a tiny golden circle wraps around the knuckle of his finger (as far down as he could get it, what with the webbing). Captain put the ring there himself. He kissed Ninchi when he did it and told him they were ‘married.’ 

It bothered Ninchi at first. A wife is baggage, isn’t that what Captain said? A weight around your feet? Ninchi isn’t a weight! He swims just fine in the ocean! He won’t ever hold Captain back!

But then, Captain explained. Marriage is a promise. A ring shows the togetherness. Captain let Ninchi put a ring on his finger, too. It felt special. Intimate and important. Captain wears the ring all the time now. At the big white house---the place where he works---and on the busy human streets. When he comes home and has the ring on, Ninchi’s eyes fill with stars.

Ninchi knows he is a secret. He has to be, to keep safe. But even as a secret, Captain is still proud of their bond. 

Once the winter is over, Captain’s new ship will be ready. The Covenant, it is going to be called. Once it is built, he will leave the city to go on another voyage. Ninchi will go with him. Of course. So will Noah. They will travel at The Covenant’s side wherever it goes. Watching. Talking to Papa through their connection. Eating. Laughing. Playing. Swimming. 

Always. 

It will always be like this. 

Ninchi holds his son in his arms and kisses his head. “Always,” he tells him. “I will always be by your side.” 

Him and Captain and all who come after. Ninchi will always be there.

_________________________

Years pass. 

When Noah is two years old, they welcome their second child. A girl, Kaguya. She has eyes as ruthless and scrutinizing as her father, but the rest of her face is as bright as the sun. After Kaguya, some years down the line, they welcome a pair of twins. One boy, one girl. Hoshii and Umi respectively. Their last child is another boy. This one they call Masayoshi, the second, a junior. 

Shido wanted a son bear to his name for particular reasons. 

Through his success, he is eventually promoted to commodre. This puts him in command of a fleet of his own. From there, he is promoted to rear admiral, then vice admiral. He moves through the ranks naturally. Buoyed by his own hard-earned accomplishments. He is a fair but uncompromising admiral, and his men are loyal to him out of respect, love, and fear of their own mortality. Shido’s enemies have a nasty habit of disappearing. Last seen near water in most cases. It’s an uncanny twist of fate, and it leads many to believe that Shido has been blessed by the sea. That the sea itself desires him to live (since he did not die in the shipwreck either!) and to see him rise to power. Higher and higher. As high as he can go.

Around the time Hoshii and Umi are born, Shido announces his children’s presence to the world. He brings them all to the Municipal House and claims them as dependents, declaring them citizens of Royal City. His heirs. 

The world is fairly shook by the announcement. That day, a crowd gathers at the Municipal House. They gawk at the mystery children that suddenly appeared in their famous admiral’s arms. 

But Shido explains it succinctly without fear. 

“I am not ashamed of my children,” he proclaims with his head held high. Prompting Noah to straighten his shoulders, and Kaguya to smile politely as she meets the eyes of all who look at her. The baby twins luxuriate in their father’s arms, fully awake and wide-eyed. 

“It is no scandalous affair.” He lifts the hand that wears his wedding ring. “When I was shipwrecked, I met a woman in a distant land. Her village is indigenous, unknown to our society. They are extremely private. But her heart was true. She cared for me. I promised to keep her existence a secret and I have up until this day. When my son Noah was born, we said our vows before God.” Murmurs spread through the crowd. “So the children are legitimate. Now they are fellow citizens, same as any of us. I ask that you leave us our dignity and our privacy, since my wife has no intention of making a public appearance. Thank you for understanding.” 

Of course people have more questions, but the story checks out. Shido has never invited anyone to his mysterious second home. No one even knows how to get there! And that wedding ring! Everyone remembers what he said at the time he started wearing it. So they believe him.

And again, it’s not too far from the truth. 

Some years after this announcement, the governor makes an announcement of his own. He will be stepping down from his position and retiring. People clamor for Shido to take his place. He seriously considers it. 

But in the end, he turns it down. 

He can’t stand the idea of being away from the sea. The sea is his true home. Where Ninchi is, always. Where they can be together without breaking the limits of their bond (which feels as natural as a limb now). Besides, Shido is too old. By the time Masayoshi is born, he is already in his late sixties!

As for his children…

Naturally, his children are ambitious. Although they all have different goals.

Noah enlists in the navy and spends most of his life on the sea, just like his father. He’s most comfortable at sea, where he can stretch his fins if he needs to, but in the company of humans most of the time. Comrades, brothers, extended family. It’s a good, carefree life. 

Kaguya becomes a foregin dignitary. She is adept at learning languages and reading people, two assets that make her indispensable in her job. She is so comfortable on land that she almost never takes her fish form. She lives as a normal human, raises a family, and leads a good, though hectic, life. 

The twins decide to abandon human society altogether. They always felt a strong affinity in deep parts of the ocean, swimming alongside Ninchi. They learn the ways of the Sharkblood clan as Ninchi teaches. When they’re of age, Ninchi introduces them to his clan and, miraculously, the clan accepts. They are Sharkbloods, after all, and clan bonds can never be truly broken. So they live the rest of their lives as mermaids. Seamlessly integrated, although their lives will be half as long. (Half-merfolk on land have even shorter lifespans, living only to be about a hundred or so. In the sea, they will reach closer to two or three hundred.)

And Masayoshi…

Perhaps because he’s the last, or because they share the same name, he is Shido’s favorite. Shido dotes on him, taking him everywhere, making him his shadow. He raises him to succeed him in every way. He pours all of his ruthlessness, his ambition, and his cutthroat philosophies into his youngest son. He wants to make him the governor---and a good one at that. Should there be any unfavorable inclinations towards the king (which, by the time Masayoshi is in his early twenties, is certainly the case), well then. Masayoshi knows what he must do.

He grows to be every bit as shrewd as his father. Even more so. Pitiless, some might say. But a good leader. Strong in character and drive. The perfect successor. 

So, when it is time for Shido to leave this world, he feels accomplished. He’s led a good life. He has everything he needs. A man’s fate, he knows, is capricious as hell. A wind blowing in the wrong direction can change everything! But Shido played his cards right. He made his own fate. Carved a place for himself and his family in this world. 

He couldn’t be prouder of what he’s done. 

His last spoken words are to Masayoshi: “Audenes Fortuna iuvat.” And Masayoshi learns the lesson well. 

The words that he shares with Ninchi, through their connection, are anyone’s guess. When he dies, Ninchi sharply grieves. He holds his head to Shido’s chest for a long time. Resting on him as if he’s sleeping. While his eyes are closed, pearl-like tears leak out. It’s only natural. He stays by Shido’s side for days afterward, not even his own children can pry him away. 

After several days, Ninchi lets go on his own. He makes a sound like an abrupt wail and wordlessly crawls to the water. Hoshii and Umi greet him, but he swims past them. Finding a place where he can sing the music he shared with his partner. Alone. 

He sings to himself for a long time. 

At the end of this time, Ninchi returns to his children. His new mission, his goal for the rest of his long life, will be to tend to the offspring that live on land. He and Captain had five children, three of whom live amongst humans. Now those children have children! Kaguya already has two. These children who do not live in the sea must be protected. 

Always. 

As promised. 

Ninchi is not sad anymore. He knows what he has to do. His bond is as strong as ever. But now, instead of binding him to Captain, his bond connects him to the future. Captain, and everything he loved, lives on in the offspring. So Ninchi must always be by their side. 

As the ages pass, the future generations learn of Ninchi’s existence when they are ready. Some of them learn about their special abilities (scaly bodies that are at home in the sea) earlier than others. They know enough to keep it a secret, but to never be ashamed. When they meet Ninchi, it feels like meeting an old friend. Someone they’ve known forever but forgot the face of. It’s more like a reunion rather than an introduction.

Ninchi is family. They all are. This is their story. 

The future generations respect that story. Their ancestors. Their grandfather, their great grandfather, their great great grandfather. A captain who had an incomparable love of the sea. They learn how he married a mermaid boy, who became a matriarch, a mother. A protector. A guardian angel. Someone who keeps watch over them even now from the furthest reaches of the sea. 

The captain’s fish wife.

  
  


~~End~~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know what you're thinking. Where is he? Where's Goro Akechi? Haha sorry, it's going to be a while before this boy gets his debut in this universe (a special boy has a special place just for him). Maybe someday I'll write that novel too ^__^ 
> 
> Thanks for indulging me on this one, guys! Hope you enjoyed!


End file.
